US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

https://www.macrumors.com/2024/01/16/us-app-store-alternative-purchase-option/

by virgildotcodes • 3 years ago

911 1238 3 years ago

macrumors.com

virgildotcodes• 3 years ago

Apologies for the maimed title. The maximum title length for submissions is too restrictive IMO.

throwaway20373• 3 years ago

Why was this downvoted? It is a good comment. Thank you to clarify.

Wowfunhappy• 3 years ago

This list of requirements to save 3 percentage points is absurd. Approximately no one is going to use this. Which I'm sure is the point.

pmontra2• 3 years ago

I'm sure about that. I forecast that there will be plenty of money spent to remove those hurdles and to defend them. Lawyers rejoice!

maronato• 3 years ago

You know what else is usually close to 3%? Credit card fees.

az2264• 3 years ago

r/MaliciousCompliance

meteor333• 3 years ago

wow! Looks like Apple finally caved.

This is a huge win for the developers, despite that pesky warning. They can still ask users to circumvent apple pay/in-app purchases and get away by not giving a revenue cut to Apple.

danpalmer8• 3 years ago

Contractually, developers are still required to pay 27% commission to Apple (or 12% for the small business programme). i.e. Apple are only removing a 3% payment processing fee here.

They say it'll be hard to actually audit this, and it will, and many developers may manage to get around it, but technically that's a breach of contract and they could be removed from the store for it, so I'm sure many won't risk it.

jrks11o• 3 years ago

What about sketchy apps with subscriptions, are those still managed via Apple? As an end user, I like the fact I can just cancel through Apple instead of having to find my way around a 3rd party site that is trying its best to prevent me from unsubscribing.

MBCook14• 3 years ago

They didn’t cave. A court gave them no choice.

nerdawson• 3 years ago

They want a 27% commission on sales made from those links and the right to audit companies' accounts for compliance.

https://twitter.com/dhh/status/1747406430054097099

It's beyond a joke. Between that and the payment processing fees, you're no better off. In fact, you get all of the same costs but none of the benefits of Apple's app store native payment infrastructure.

danenania5• 3 years ago

It seems a lot more egregious that anything Microsoft did in the 90s. While MS tried to push their own products and lock out competitors, they never tried to take a massive cut of all the software on their OS. The level of sheer FU everyone chutzpah is pretty impressive.

They're indeed making quite a joke out of antitrust at this point.

karlshea• 3 years ago

I'm not sure that's a direct comparison. Back then sure you could get shareware but mostly the market was paid boxed software. I can't find a direct source but I remember hearing brick-and-mortar retailers would take even more than 30% of sales. And Visual Studio sure wasn't free.

Everything was different though, you'd be paying for your OS upgrades too which doesn't happen on iOS. I agree 30% is crazy, but the market on iOS they're enabling has to get paid for somehow. That source of revenue was different for Microsoft in the 80s/90s but it still existed.

MBCook14• 3 years ago

Microsoft had like 95% of the market.

Apple has 50%. Courts have already ruled they’re not a monopoly. Epic asked the Supreme Court to look at that again and they specifically decided not to and to leave the decision in place.

That’s why Apple can do what they’re (now, post order) doing legally and Microsoft couldn’t.

greg_V• 3 years ago

Apple is acting like a state within their domain. Collecting a VAT and requiring compliance that's reserved usually for the national tax office with inspective powers.

Having locked in the richest consumers of the world, they get to say what goes and what doesn't, worldly courts and laws be damned.

It's both hilarious and gruesome at the same time, because we're supposed to be equal under consumer laws or whatever, but there you go!

klabb34• 3 years ago

The infuriating part is that this isn’t about computing or distribution. They already charge for that separately. It’s a triple dip just because nobody stops them.

Most of the modern digital consumer economy is based on products and services which are device-agnostic. If I’m using Spotify or Netflix or something they are service providers and the iPhone/ipad is just a client device. Apple should have no marginal returns (a cut) on money that should go to artists, actors, developers. They’ve already charged massively for both their physical products and their services.

Antitrust law is a joke. This has always been glaringly obvious since Jobs first came up with this shit. The fact that it still ain’t fixed is a travesty, not just for tech nerds, but it impedes the digital economy at large.

The greediest thing of it all is that they’re actually providing a service people would pay premium for - in-app purchases and their “all subscriptions in one place” without dark pattern harassment is very nice for consumers. They have a legit product worth a ton yet they still refuse to compete fairly. Anti-market capitalism..

throwitaway1123• 3 years ago

Apple is acting like a state within their domain.

Someone unironically complained yesterday that developers who don't like paying the 30% fee probably don't like paying their taxes, and I made the exact same argument that Apple was acting like a sovereign state [0]. And now Apple is doubling down by announcing that they'll be performing financial audits just like the Internal Revenue Service if you include a link to purchase content/services outside of the app store.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39007657

btown• 3 years ago

This is still huge for mobile gaming, though. Per https://developer.apple.com/support/storekit-external-entitl... :

Apple’s commission will be 27% on proceeds you earn from sales (“transactions“) to the user for digital goods or services on your website after a link out (i.e., they tap “Continue” on the system disclosure sheet), provided that the sale was initiated within seven days and the digital goods or services can be used in an app.

As any F2P gamer knows, “whales” don’t just spend up front - they make microtransactions on a regular basis for months or years as new rewards become available. This is incredibly meaningful for game publishers who depend on long-term customer engagement.

542458• 3 years ago

right to audit companies' accounts for compliance

I’m not sure why the audit requirement is getting called out. That seems pretty standard for this type of revenue sharing agreement to me.

lxgr22• 3 years ago

So Apple will be collecting 27% (instead of 30%) for... what exactly?

They might just get away with something as crass in a vacuum, but given that the DMA will go into effect very soon, there will be a point of reference in a similar economy, and I don't think it'll be pretty for Apple.

US regulators (federal or state; I could see something equivalent to GDPR and CCPA) will be taking a very close look.

danpalmer8• 3 years ago

So Apple will be collecting 27% (instead of 30%) for... what exactly?

Off the top of my head...

- Bandwidth

- Running the App Store for users

- Marketing the App Store

- App review

- Security efforts to keep malware off the store

- Making App Store optimisation tools for developers

There's a lot of moving parts to this. You could argue that none of this is necessary if you sideload, but distribution is worth a lot in general to businesses, and I think it's clear that the App Store is a good distribution channel in many ways – easy to use for sellers (vs via traditional publishers, or physical retail), and easy to use for buyers.

lxgr22• 3 years ago

If that's true (and I even believe that it is to a large extent!), there should be no problem for Apple to let its value proposition stand for itself and allow some competition.

Besides that, that list is very bundled. What if I e.g. want the convenient subscription payment processing, but want to (or need to) bring my own CDN for most content? What if I want their marketing and am willing to pay for it, but prefer my own payment processing?

Hikikomori2• 3 years ago

So charge a fee based on usage of the specific services then? Flat 30% of monthly subscriptions when they're not even providing the service of sending that audio and video to the device is insane.

grishka2• 3 years ago

Sure, all these things cost a lot of money. What if I would like to market, host, and distribute my own app, without any Apple involvement?

From my own experience, the app store brings negative value to both the users and the developers in many cases. It's most often seen not as the godsend like Apple portrays it, but as a stupid obstacle course that you need to clear every time you publish a new app or an update to an existing one, and sometimes even when you don't.

tick_tock_tick2• 3 years ago

So basically nothing that companies couldn't do themselves if Apple didn't explicitly block it. You pay 27% for fuck all.

distribution is worth a lot in general to businesses

No, digital distribution is worth so little it rounds to $0.

App Store is a good distribution channel in many ways

It's the only distribution channel allowed so of course it's the "best" there is no competition allowed.

rstupek2• 3 years ago

You can probably include development of SDKs and documentation as well.

DaiPlusPlus2• 3 years ago

My company's SaaS product used to have an iOS and Android app which we discontinued a couple of years ago when Safari finally started supporting more web-standards that enabled our PWA to more-or-less have parity with the old app (confession: our app was using Xamarin instead of being truly native, not that it mattered much).

...so with that context in-mind, we don't benefit from - nor really need at all, most of those services you're referring to;

Bandwidth

We're a small B2B SaaS with a userbase sized under 100,000 users and our old app bundle was around ~20MB and updated a handful of times per year, so even if 100% of our users used the iOS app with auto-updates then that's less than 2GB of data-transfer per published update - the cost of serving that is far less than a rounding-error on AWS/Azure.

Running the App Store for users

I accept that.

Marketing the App Store

No-one should be paying for Apple to market their own App Store - and as a B2B SaaS app, Apple would never promote us or do marketing for us.

App review

I also accept this - but ostensibly this is what your $99/yr developer fee pays for.

Security efforts to keep malware off the store

This is the same thing as App review; if we look more broadly, then it's better to compare this to Microsoft's Windows Defender which is free, and is funded independently of the Microsoft App Store.

Making App Store optimisation tools for developers

Again, this is Apple's responsibility to pay for, not ours - and even-then consider that efficient update/patch distribution systems have been around for decades so it's hardly cutting-edge development (e.g. those ~KB-sized binary diff patches for CD-installed games in the late-1990s when we were on dial-up, like EA had for SimCity 3000 or C&C Red Alert 2)

For a B2B SaaS client app for BYOD users the iOS App Store is perfectly fine as a distribution system, and morally I'm fine with paying Apple some kind of fee for the benefits of their distribution system, but Apple has no legitimate claim to any percentage of the subscription fees we get from our users - so what this means is that we can make our app available for free to our users (which is fine, honestly) but (as per my understanding of the rules) we cannot offer any kind of account-management or billing-management for their SaaS subscriptions from within the app which isn't ideal.

I think Apple's main mistake here was deciding that having a single set of rules and fee-schedules/commission/etc for everyone, because the revenue models for exploitative mobile games (especially their gold/gems IAPs) differs massively from my company's unimaginatively dry B2B SaaS client.

kevingadd2• 3 years ago

All of that can easily be funded by the margins Apple makes off device sales alone combined with the fees you pay to become a developer.

Even if for some reason you believe that's not true, there's no way they need 27% of all purchase revenue on the store to fund that stuff. The numbers simply don't check out. 30% was an arbitrary cut and that's why they can easily drop it to 27% or (for small devs as of recently) 15%.

In the situations we're discussing, both the app developer and every customer have already given apple hundreds if not thousands of dollars worth of revenue. Out of that, Apple has a healthy margin.

Now we're talking about Apple sticking their fingers into developers' pockets for every single transaction even if Apple's participation in that transaction is limited to updating a couple database rows to indicate that Customer XXXXX bought DLC Package YYYY in App ZZZZZ. There is simply no way that is worth 30%. They're not doing that much work.

MBCook14• 3 years ago

The DMA has surprisingly little effect on the US.

In the EU has the 30% (or now 27%) been found illegal? I know they’re being forced to allow other app stores or side loading or something. But what about the fee?

lxgr22• 3 years ago

I wouldn't be so sure about that.

For obvious reasons, the US government and justice system is probably not interested in being the beta tester for such a regulation – they have relatively little to gain and much to lose. Even "green bubbles" seem to be a much bigger point of contention in US public discourse than sideloading/the 30% tax.

But if the DMA it ends up working well well and consumers like it, and app store customers manage to sell that fact to the US voting population, the wind could change for Apple too.

Vespasian• 3 years ago

Well if they try any shady business here (e.g. forcing a fee, limiting competitors contractually, lot's of big scary warnings for everything) the EU is standing by for rounds two, three etc.

The regulatory rules passed in the DMA are written to allow action without the need to go through the whole legislative process.

I predict it will come to that. Apple is gonna fight this tooth and nail to the very end. And unless they change their attitude and business practices, Europe has very little too lose by piling more and more rules on them.

The 27% is not really a problem if there were a competitive market. If one emerges we'll see if not...see above.

throwaway20373• 3 years ago

DMA: I had to look it up. For others: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Markets_Act

<< The DMA covers eight different sectors, which it refers to as Core Platforms Services (CPS). Due to the presence of gatekeepers who, to a certain degree, affect the market contestability, the CPS are considered problematic by the European Commission:

online search engines (e.g. Google Search);

online intermediation services (e.g. Google Play Store, Apple's App Store);

social networks (e.g. Facebook);

video sharing platforms (e.g. YouTube);

communication platforms (e.g. WhatsApp, Gmail);

advertising services (e.g. Google Ads);

operating systems (e.g. Android, iOS);

cloud services (e.g. Amazon Web Services).[4] >>

sprite• 3 years ago

https://developer.apple.com/support/storekit-external-entitl...

They are taking 27%, between that and processing fees you might as well use In App Purchases.

"Apple’s commission will be 27% on proceeds you earn from sales (“transactions“) to the user for digital goods or services on your website after a link out (i.e., they tap “Continue” on the system disclosure sheet), provided that the sale was initiated within seven days and the digital goods or services can be used in an app. This includes (a) any applicable taxes and (b) any adjustments for refunds, reversals and chargebacks. For auto-renewing subscriptions, (i) a sale initiated, including with a free trial or offer, within seven days after a link out is a transaction; and (ii) each subsequent auto-renewal after the subscription is initiated is also a transaction.] If you’re a participant in the Small Business Program, or if the transaction is an auto-renewal in the second year or later of an auto-renewing subscription, the commission will be 12%. These commission rates apply to all amounts paid by each user net of transaction taxes charged by you. You will be responsible for the collection and remittance of any applicable taxes for sales processed by a third-party payment provider. If you adopt this entitlement, you will be required to provide transaction reports within 15 calendar days following the end of each calendar month. Even if there were no transactions, you’re required to provide a report stating that is the case. If the cadence changes, we will update this page. To learn about the details that will need to be included in the report, view example reports. In the future, if Apple develops an API to facilitate reporting, you will be required to adopt such API within 30 days with an update of your app and follow the timing and requirements provided."

EMIRELADERO2• 3 years ago

This is in response to them losing that part of the Epic lawsuit and exhausting all appeals (SCOTUS denied cert yesterday). It's not a voluntary decision.

lxgr22• 3 years ago

It's also not a concession in any way.

Depending on the payment method used, they might just make a profit on this (e.g. some cards charge more than 3% of interchange alone, and there's other fees on top).

steve_taylor• 3 years ago

There’s also chargeback risk, which I imagine is quite high for digital purchases.

newprint• 3 years ago

My feeling is that this is a half measure and any half measure allow for the "freedom of interpretations". AAPL will put a lot of road blocks around external purchase links (result of recent ruling). I expect apps that will use external purchase links to be scrutinize a lot more, unexpectedly take off from the AAPL app store for made-up reasons and myriad of other road blocks around the ruling. You know, AAPL needs it's 30% cut.

MBCook14• 3 years ago

They’ll try. That’s who Apple is.

But court has also found their required to do this. So if there are roadblocks are onerous you know someone’s going to go running to the court to try and get that fixed.

They could end up in big trouble if they try and fight it too hard. But they’re also not gonna roll over.

Expect the same exact thing with the DMA changes in the EU.

danpalmer8• 3 years ago

This is not new. The 27% fee has been around for over a year now I think, may have been announced in 2021 even, for markets outside the US that already mandate this. I've seen these screens already in apps.

Vt71fcAqt7• 3 years ago

It seems like according to Sweeny the 27% rate itself is not new but it only went into effect today.[0]

[0] https://twitter.com/TimSweeneyEpic/status/174728054136210228...

danpalmer8• 3 years ago

I think this is still just a US announcement.

This was announced for dating apps in the Netherlands in Feb 2022, I think Korea also has had similar changes. https://www.computerworld.com/article/3649111/apple-begins-t...

MBCook14• 3 years ago

In the US.

As GP mentioned it has been in effect for a while in Holland and maybe Korea or a few other places for at least certain kinds of apps due to local laws.

Interesting note: this only applies to the US. I know the EU is forcing changes as well, but those are EU only.

So South America, Asia, Australia, Africa, Canada, Mexico, and others haven’t changed one bit and likely still require 30%.

lxgr22• 3 years ago

It's been mandated for dating apps in the Netherlands, to my knowledge. It being allowed for all apps in the US is arguably still news.

throwaway20373• 3 years ago

mandated for dating apps in the Netherlands

In this scenario, is there something specific that we should know/understand about (a) dating apps or (b) the Netherlands?

mortenjorck• 3 years ago

Demanding a 27% commission for transactions taking place entirely outside of Apple infrastructure is obviously a finger in the eye, but I'm not entirely sure whose eye yet. Epic? The court? The FTC? The developer community? All of the above?

cyral• 3 years ago

I love how apple has provided suggested language, such as "To get [X%] off, go to [X]", knowing damn well that a discount would only be offered if they weren't collecting a commission.

Add to that that the link can only be displayed on a single page (not a modal or popup) and cannot be part of a purchase flow (where else would it go?). Certainly a huge slap in the face to all developers and the court's intent.

They also say that using parameters in the URL is a privacy concern, when the real reason is they don't want you to use some kind of one-time-link to log the user in. They want the user to have to log in again, making it as painful (and least likely to convert) as possible.

tick_tock_tick2• 3 years ago

All of the above for sure.

themerone• 3 years ago

A 27% cut will make a 3rd party payment service a non starter for all but the biggest app.

For small players a 3% savings isn't worth the administrative overhead of paying apple separately.

Apple is begging for another lawsuit over this.

yakz• 3 years ago

Is there a 3% savings there or is that just covering the typical fee from the payment processor?

dns_snek11• 3 years ago

The latter, Stripe charges a 2.9% + 30c fee in the US for example.

sircastor3• 3 years ago

Remember that Apple charges 15% for everyone making less than 1M in revenue. And the range applied for external processing is going largely correlate with Apples offerings.

Apple doesn’t see their cut as “payment processing and hosting”. They see it as the cost of selling for their platform.

tommymachine• 3 years ago

This appears to be a huge boon, due to the fact that developers can now send their external marketing directly to their own online landing/checkout pages. Apple appears to be only charging commission for traffic sent there and that checks out within 7 days of clicking the in app link.

In other words, a developer can have a Facebook ad or similar go directly to the checkout page and buy the app there, bypassing the app store commission for traffic the developer is bringing to the app store themselves. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong on this.

This being the case, any recommendations for carts / processing services / etc that would be ideally positioned for this kind of use are MASSIVELY welcome!!!

radley4• 3 years ago

There's a strong chance this will be shot down as "bad-faith" compliance. Rumor is Epic will quickly contest it [Update: confirmed]

https://twitter.com/timsweeneyepic/status/174740814726057173...

turquoisevar10• 3 years ago

Depends.

If we’re talking about the details of the implementation, maybe.

If it’s about the commission that still needs to be paid, then no. That’s directly mentioned in the original ruling by the district court, a commission is due regardless.

radley4• 3 years ago

I think the real problem is unlimited access to accounting books for any business that has an iOS app. This will affect free apps too, since they now have the potential to offer purchases outside the app store. (Obviously, strategic partners and FAANG are exempt.)

rideontime• 3 years ago

My eyes glazed over while scrolling the OP's list of restrictions. I'd probably want to sue rather than try to implement all that too.

stevage4• 3 years ago

They weren't all restrictions, some were things you can do.

scythe• 3 years ago

If you don't want to read a lot of boring swill, you definitely don't want to participate in a lawsuit.

judge20204• 3 years ago

It'll probably need to be another lawsuit since it's in the developer agreement. Via user lolinder ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39020745 ):

Apple is already pretty clear in its developer agreement [0] that the 30% commission is for "its services as Your agent and/or commissionaire" (Schedule 2 3.4), not for its services as a payment processor. They are contractually allowed to take the 30% fee out of payments collected, but merely using a different payment processor doesn't remove the obligation to pay them for their other "services as Your agent and/or commissionaire".

0: https://developer.apple.com/support/terms/apple-developer-pr...

In addition, from the original ruling:

Yvonne-Gonzalez was skeptical of the 30% fee during the trial, and in the ruling she was suspicious about Apple's justification of the commission, writing that "the 30% is not tied to anything in particular and can be changed," but did not order Apple to do so.

justinclift3• 3 years ago

It'll probably need to be another lawsuit since it's in the developer agreement.

Mind you, you can be blocked from doing needed Apple dev stuff (eg sign binaries, etc) until you've manually logged into your Apple account and clicked on the "I accept" button whenever they change terms.

This happened to us (sqlitebrowser.org) in recent weeks, as our CI just stopped working one day.

It turns out there was a new developer agreement that needed signing, and until I'd logged in and done that then Apples servers would no longer sign binaries.

There's literally no choice but to sign the things - regardless of terms - if you want your users to have software that runs.

threeseed8• 3 years ago

Will be interesting to see Epic file a lawsuit questioning the legality of per-sale licensing models for SDKs.

You know given they charge exactly the same way for Unreal Engine.

judge20204• 3 years ago

To add, I'm not sure what legal basis there is for "you're charging too much". My only guess is filing against Apple and Google jointly for being a duopoly, but Epic has made it extremely hard to do something like this because of their existing jury trial against Google which gives a lot of concessions to third-party app stores in terms of functionality.

newZWhoDis• 3 years ago

Yvonne-Gonzalez was skeptical of the 30% fee during the trial, and in the ruling she was suspicious about Apple's justification of the commission, writing that "the 30% is not tied to anything in particular and can be changed," but did not order Apple to do so.

We really do live in clown world

volleygman180• 3 years ago

Apple's justification seems counterintuitive, given that the commission only applies to app sales or in-app purchases. Since free apps don't pay anything, what is the commission for if not for "services as a payment provider"?

bsimpson• 3 years ago

Holy crap!

Apple is charging a commission on digital purchases initiated within seven days from link out, as described below. This will not capture all transactions that Apple has facilitated through the App Store, but is a reasonable means to account for the substantial value Apple provides developers, including in facilitating linked transactions.
Apple’s commission will be 27% on proceeds you earn from sales (“transactions“) to the user for digital goods or services on your website after a link out (i.e., they tap “Continue” on the system disclosure sheet), provided that the sale was initiated within seven days and the digital goods or services can be used in an app.

So tl;dr: of that page is that Apple is saying "if you wanna link to your website, it can't be prominent (only a single text link with our language in our chosen placement) and we still get our commission."

SllX13• 3 years ago

I’m not sure Epic actually has standing anymore.

They did back when they were part of the developer program. If they can make their case that it is bad faith compliance as part of their original case before the Court goes “c’ya, we’re done here”, they might have something, but Apple revoked Epic’s membership for violating their terms in the developer program worldwide and at the conclusion of this lawsuit, Apple has not been ordered to reinstate it. So Epic can’t really argue that they have or will have suffered a harm under these new terms since they’re still in a position where Apple isn’t doing business with them and their lawsuit under which they did have standing is basically at its conclusion.

ocdtrekkie2• 3 years ago

I agree. As much as I disagree with the ruling the courts made, they definitely decided Apple was allowed to ban Epic for their store permanently, and so Apple's fees no longer are Epic's problem, legally speaking. Someone else would have to be willing to invest the funding on the legal battle, with pockets as deep as Tim's and the same willingness to go up against a Goliath... one that already won against Epic, and won't be bought out a special deal. Tim Sweeney was uniquely concerned with getting fair treatment for everyone here and that is shockingly rare in billionaire CEOs.

hn_throwaway_995• 3 years ago

IANAL, but at face value, that seems like it would be, well, quite insane? To emphasize, I've seen plenty of insane stuff in the legal system, but if the argument is basically that Epic doesn't have standing because Apple won't let them be in a position where they could have standing, yet they generally offer that position (dev program membership) to the public at large, that seems like some sort of Catch-22-ish nightmare.

Again, little surprises me in the legal system these days, but I have to think courts would be very skeptical of an argument where a potential defendant controls the gates that decide whether a potential plaintiff has standing.

w10-12• 3 years ago

A "bad faith" claim essentially admits Apple is in fact in compliance.

It's the weakest objection you can have, and typically would only be sufficient to get relief in very, very specific circumstances where the unfairness could be proven (as intended). But this case involves broad policies for millions of developers, and it's perfectly compliant with permitting other payment processors.

So: there's almost no chance it would be "shot down" on those grounds.

dns_snek11• 3 years ago

How are they possibly in compliance? The judgement was about Apple's "steering practices", not just allowing 3rd party payment processing.

They're clearly making Apple's in-app purchases the preferential choice by prohibiting developers from using anything but a single plain text link, and scaring users with strongly worded warnings.

lolinder12• 3 years ago

What exactly is bad faith about this compliance? The original ruling specifically called out that Apple would still be entitled to a commission even if people used alternative payment processors.

The main thing that feels icky to me is the hurdles to getting approved to link to alternative payment methods, but even if those are walked back that doesn't solve the main issue, which is that alternative payment providers were never a sensible solution to Apple's tax.

Apple has always argued that the commission is for the App Store, not for payment processing, and it is only collected through their payment processor as a matter of convenience. The policy announced here is essentially the same that they announced two years ago in the Netherlands in response to a similar ruling [0]. I'm surprised that anyone here is surprised that they're doing the same thing in the US.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30204604

jonhohle2• 3 years ago

Yeah, as much as I defend Apple against the “they have a monopoly on the iPhone” crowd, this seems worse than the original restrictions. People have been buying stuff online for decades. There’s no new security issue at play here. Taking a commission from a company that’s already paying for payment processing can’t possibly be seen as reasonable.

How are they even going to attempt to enforce compliance. Is every store required to integrate with their payments API?

If they’re taking payments from the platform and it does turn out to be a scam, now their hands are dirty as well.

dwaite10• 3 years ago

... this seems worse than the original restrictions.

This is worse from the original restrictions _specifically_ because the original restrictions were chosen to simplify from this sort of scenario.

If Apple says all app purchases and purchases of digital goods/services within the app are subject to the 15/30%, and those payments are always made through Apple, then Apple can check for non-compliance with the contract terms up-front (via App Store review) and then there are no separate books to audit, there is no commingling of revenue from in-app purchases vs independent web purchases or purchases made on other platforms, and so on. No need to audit the company's books, because they are using Apple's books.

It is hard to take Apple to task for charging too much, because the 30% ceiling and who pays it has effectively been the same since day 1 of the App Store. They have only created special cases to reduce that percentage (small business program, multi-year subscriptions).

Regulators can say that you can't block other companies from the "iPhone in-app payment for digital goods" market without being anti-competitive, but it is much more onerous to force a company to continue to provide a set of services (maintaining developer tools and SDKs, reviewing and signing binaries, providing backward compatibility in new OS versions) but for a fee schedule determined by regulators.

Taking a commission from a company that’s already paying for payment processing can’t possibly be seen as reasonable.

Why not?

There's a decades-running assumption by some that Apple was a ridiculously expensive payment processor, only existing because they gave you no other choice than to use them for certain things (and outright forbade you from using them for others).

But Apple provides other services and access to developers per a financial agreement, and was doing payment processing to meter the revenue split.

The regulator argument is that Apple is blocking other companies from taking in-app revenue for digital services. Apple has now split that out in a few markets for companies willing to take on such complexity.

IMHO the only apps I think actually have benefited from the split are dating apps in the Netherlands - because quite frankly the way many dating services charge people is user hostile and/or discriminatory.

dkonofalski2• 3 years ago

How are they even going to attempt to enforce compliance.

Per the judge's own words, Apple is allowed access to the company's financials and other information that would allow them to audit developers' use of third-party payment systems.

qarl3• 3 years ago

I'd love to hear your reasoning for why there is a strong chance this will be struck down.

The court didn't rule against the Apple Tax, just on the monopoly for payment provider. I understand that many people misunderstand this point, but that does not change it.

bluefirebrand2• 3 years ago

The Apple Tax is very clearly tied to the app store though.

By trying to make it apply to apps purchased on other stores, they are essentially saying they have a right to add a commission fee to any transaction involving Apps that happens on an Apple Device, which seems like an overreach to me.

lacker• 3 years ago

These conditions are onerous enough that the Kindle app probably still cannot handle in-app purchases. It's really pretty annoying that I have to leave the Kindle iOS app and go to the Kindle web app to make a purchase. Obviously it wouldn't cost either Apple or Amazon anything to allow this, it wouldn't be insecure or unsafe in any way, and it would be nice for consumers. So the fact that Apple and Amazon haven't made a deal to allow this indicates to me that Apple is putting its competitive interests ahead of its users interests.

Hopefully they all figure something out eventually to allow Kindle purchases from the app.

karmasimida• 3 years ago

I found myself actually able to use browser to purchase Kindle books on iPhone now, is it because of this lawsuit?

lxgr22• 3 years ago

Do you mean an in-app browser in the Kindle app, or just amazon.com in Safari?

I don't see how Apple would prohibit me from visiting a website, and they've allowed use of content/subscriptions purchased elsewhere in iOS apps for a while now.

What has not been allowed (at least until today) is to directly link to that external website.

radley4• 3 years ago

Apple can't control browser content, only capabilities, so you could always make purchases via Safari, Chrome, etc.

ncallaway2• 3 years ago

No, in a regular browser you can make purchases on Amazon like normal.

If you attempt to purchase a kindle book from within the kindle app, you will not be able to. Nor will there be any messaging explaining how to make a purchase (because apple does not allow such messaging). You’ll just be mysteriously confused about why you can’t buy a book.

rapind• 3 years ago

Apple is putting its competitive interests ahead of its users interests

I kind of figured this already when there's no way to filter apps by "doesn't have in-app purchases".

interpol_p6• 3 years ago

Hah! Actually, they have kind of done this with Apple Arcade, and charge you a $10 subscription for the service

bradgessler• 3 years ago

Am I getting this right? Say I use Stripe as my payment processor. Stripe takes 2.9% + $0.30, then Apple takes 27% so I'm at 29.9% + $0.30 being taken out of however much I charge for my app? For a $10 app, $0.30 is 3% putting the fee at 32.9%.

For the privilege of paying 2.9% more, my users get to see a scary privacy message and when I bill the customer a year later for a subscription, there's a 20-30% chance that their credit card will have expired.

If this isn't a monopoly abusing its dominate market position, then what is?

jacquesm30• 3 years ago

Oh absolutely it is. But all app store developers are complicit in enabling that monopoly. What should happen is that all app store developers withdraw their apps until Apple sees the light. But that won't happen because every app store developer will be pitted against their competition in a race to the bottom who will accept the highest fees that Apple is going to impose and sooner or later you'll be back at that 30% or you'll go without income. Solidarity is what drives change, without solidarity you're without a chance.

aaomidi2• 3 years ago

Victim blaming and expects a mass market behavior change is not good, or realistic.

nicoburns• 3 years ago

What should happen is that governments regulate these policies out of existence (or into sensibility). We already do this for things like credit card processing fees (in Europe) and it works well.

jamil7• 3 years ago

This is a weird take. It’s similar to saying workers pre unionisation and labour movements were complicit in enabling poor working conditions.

threeseed8• 3 years ago

I suspect that after 15 years of the App Store existing most developers know the score.

And so by all means withdraw your app but the rest of us will simply continue to pay the 15/30% as we have always done.

lapcat11• 3 years ago

There are so many problems with this take. Here are a few:

1) Many App Store apps are completely free, paying nothing to Apple except the $99 per year fee, so they have no stake in this issue.

2) My understanding is that more than 90% of developers in the App Store make less than $1 million per year and thus are covered by the Small Business Program, which charges only 15% rather than 30%. Revenue in the App Store is extremely top-heavy, with most going to a relatively small number of the top developers (such as Epic, previously). How much are developers willing to risk just to lower the 15% cut somewhat?

3) Let's be clear, you're talking about a strike. Many developers derive their entire income from the App Store, so withdrawing their apps means no income. A wealthy corporation such as Epic can survive, but what about little indie developers?

4) An individual developer uniterally striking would be futile and self-destructive. Developers would need to be organized and all strike simultaneously.

5) Strikes are very difficult to organize. Forming a union almost always has to come first. And union members typically work together in the same building, which greatly facilitates organization. Whereas there are a huge number of App Store developers scattered all around the world, and they speak different languages. How would you even communicate with all of them to organize? (EDIT: I see in another comment that you think it's easy as spreading cat memes. That's not a serious suggestion.)

dylan6044• 3 years ago

How is this any different from brick&mortar big box retailers beating on their suppliers to lower their wholesale prices to the point they can only make a profit with large volume in sales? I guarantee you that 70% of your MSRP is way more than selling in a store.

newsclues2• 3 years ago

“Solidarity is what drives change” Sounds like commie bullshit.

NoPicklez• 3 years ago

That is a ridiculous statement.

Just because developers have fallen victim does not mean they should all pull their apps. How would you suggest that all impacted developers go about coordinating such a strike?

Solidarity is very difficult to achieve in a large enough consensus to a point where people would pull their apps.

xuki• 3 years ago

Apple need the 30% to keep the services revenue up to keep the stock price up. I have no doubt many people at Apple know this is wrong, including the people at the very top, but stock must not go down.

lotsofpulp4• 3 years ago

What is the right amount of profit margin? Would this apply to households too?

onethought7• 3 years ago

How can the “second most popular phone” have a monopoly?

earthling8118• 3 years ago

You don't have to be the most popular to be a monopoly. Not even close.

kccqzy• 3 years ago

Read the ruling. It's not a monopoly. https://casetext.com/case/epic-games-inc-v-apple-inc-2

Given the trial record, the Court cannot ultimately conclude that Apple is a monopolist under either federal or state antitrust laws. While the Court finds that Apple enjoys considerable market share of over 55% and extraordinarily high profit margins, these factors alone do not show antitrust conduct. Success is not illegal. The final trial record did not include evidence of other critical factors, such as barriers to entry and conduct decreasing output or decreasing innovation in the relevant market. The Court does not find that it is impossible; only that Epic Games failed in its burden to demonstrate Apple is an illegal monopolist.

enragedcacti5• 3 years ago

You've already skipped over the most important aspect of determining if someone is a monopoly, which is defining the relevant market. A key piece of the Epic v. Apple case was determining the relevant market, where "phones" was never even considered as a possibility.

https://ei.com/economists-ink/fall-2021/market-definition-in...

lolinder12• 3 years ago

This was always what the outcome was going to look like. People have been talking ever since the ruling as though dodging Apple as a payment processor was going to magically exempt developers from the full 30% fee, but that was never going to happen and it was never the intention of the ruling.

Apple argued from the very beginning that the 30% was its fee for running the App Store, marketing the apps, and storing and delivering the app bundles. The in-app payment system was a convenient way for Apple to collect its commission and a way for Apple to create a unified payment experience for its customers, but it was never the Achilles heel for Apple's business model.

The best case scenario here is that Apple is forced to walk back some of the more onerous requirements they've imposed for whether and how links may be shown. Them putting a price on the payment processor portion of the fee and discounting developers for that portion was inevitable and isn't even malicious compliance, the judge explicitly called this out as a likely outcome in the original ruling:

First, and most significant, as discussed in the findings of facts, IAP is the method by which Apple collects its licensing fee from developers for the use of Apple’s intellectual property. Even in the absence of IAP, Apple could still charge a commission on developers. It would simply be more difficult for Apple to collect that commission.
In such a hypothetical world, developers could potentially avoid the commission while benefitting from Apple's innovation and intellectual property free of charge. The Court presumes that in such circumstances that Apple may rely on imposing and utilizing a contractual right to audit developers annual accounting to ensure compliance with its commissions, among other methods. Of course, any alternatives to IAP (including the foregoing) would seemingly impose both increased monetary and time costs to both Apple and the developers.

https://casetext.com/case/epic-games-inc-v-apple-inc-2

enragedcacti5• 3 years ago

Apple argued from the very beginning that the 30% was its fee for running the App Store, marketing the apps, and storing and delivering the app bundles. The in-app payment system was a convenient way for Apple to collect its commission and a way for Apple to create a unified payment experience for its customers, but it was never the Achilles heel for Apple's business model.

Is it just me or does this argument seem insanely flimsy? If Apple were serious about it then why aren't they charging free apps for downloads and approvals? Why doesn't the developer policy require Netflix to pay 30% of subscriptions for anyone who signs in on an Apple device? Why are the prices lower for "reader" apps who presumably cause Apple to incur similar costs?

Its like a toll road arguing "no, driving on the road is free of course, we just charge at the entrance and exit for the privilege of looking at the toll road".

What does it take for the legal system to be able to call BS on a claim like that?

scarface_746• 3 years ago

If all the developers I assume you care about left the App Store, Apple wouldn’t care. The apps that make the majority of the money on the App Store are slimy pay to win games where “whales” buy coins and loot boxes.

The other popular apps are front end for services where Apple doesn’t collect a dime like Facebook, Instagram, Netflix, etc.

turquoisevar10• 3 years ago

Yeah, the amazement amongst people here on HN amazes me.

The district court was crystal clear about this in their judgment, which at the time caused quite some consternation.

The appellate court then affirmed the same and even clarified more clearly that it’s completely fine because it primarily is the mechanic Apple gets payment for the use of their IP and, secondly, their services that encompass more than just payment processing.

In fact, if you read the appellate judgment, the annoyance towards the district court is palpable.

The annoyance stems from the fact that the district court states in their judgment that alternative ways of collecting the commission aren’t worth considering and expanding on because of how onerous they are (retroactive audit, collection efforts, etc.) while at the same time causing exactly that by striking the anti-steering provision and opening the door to third-party payment providers.

The appellate court doesn’t go further than expressing annoyance between the lines because, ultimately, the district court didn’t err substantially enough for the appellate court to step in, which is ultimately the bar that needs to be met. Appellate courts aren’t meant to relitigate cases, after all.

winter_blue4• 3 years ago

Apple argued from the very beginning that the 30% was its fee for running the App Store, marketing the apps, and storing and delivering the app bundles.

The cost of operating an App Store and providing distribution is relatively negligible. Several Linux distros have app stores, and package management and distribution systems that are as good or superior than Apple’s.

The annual fee that Apple charges developers alone should more than cover the cost of App Store. It is not something that costs tens of billions of dollars.

awesomeMilou• 3 years ago

EDIT: I just realized:

running the App Store, marketing the apps

What marketing specifically? Last time I checked, I had to integrate third party ad experiences in order to market my app in their ecosystem.

In such a hypothetical world, developers could potentially avoid the commission while benefitting from Apple's innovation and intellectual property free of charge.
Apple argued from the very beginning that the 30% was its fee for running the App Store, marketing the apps, and storing and delivering the app bundles

With hindsight of the antitrust case in the EU this argument itself seems like it is in bad faith. Apples argument in the EU against antitrust was that there isn't one but five different app stores, conveniently for each device family.

So they are indeed aware that a commercial app developer would likely not be "benefitting from Apple's innovation and intellectual property free of charge", because they are likely not taking advantage of their entire catalogue of intellectual property (if there is five different app stores, for five different markets, as per Apples argument, surely there is different IP between those markets to run the app store in an effective manner).

In other words, as others have mentioned, Apple charges a 30% flat fee for "intellectual property" that developers may or may not take advantage of, as per their own argument overseas. I don't see how it's not antitrust when a company forces me to pay for services that I am not taking advantage off or ever had the intent of using, or can't use, due to technical limitations.

As a developer, to me it rather feels like Apple is trying to artificially bind me to invest into the app store as a platform due to this high fee, for example by developing an accompanying watch applet or a tablet version of my app, because the act of simply offering these on their devices seems to be part of their precious App Store IP. And you can't argue that pricing these add-on apps differently would make a difference for Apple, since they collect the 30% cut across income in their entire ecosystem either way.

It also doesn't make sense for Apple to tell me to go elsewhere (Android) to mitigate this, as I can't replicate the UX of their ecosystem on my own even if I tried (prime example would be the peripheral integration imo. You'll find creating a device that integrates as seamlessly as the Apple Watch fairly hard, not because Apple has some special proprietary integration IP secret sauce, but because they artificially lock down ways to interface with peripherals to secure market dominance).

mvdtnz3• 3 years ago

The Court presumes that in such circumstances that Apple may rely on imposing and utilizing a contractual right to audit developers annual accounting to ensure compliance with its commissions,

To this day it remains absolutely unbelievable to me that anyone would ever agree to this. I always have and always will tell Apple to shove their app store up their ass. Plenty of other ways to make a living in software.

brettp• 3 years ago

One thing I haven't seen anyone mention which I think is the most obvious reason for commission on outside purchases: if Apple did not charge a commission on purchases made outside the app, it would leave a huge loophole - developers could just list their apps free on the App Store with limited functionality, with a link to an outside purchase to fully activate them.

babypuncher4• 3 years ago

As a user, if I go to buy something in an app and it asks me to punch in my credit card number or sign in to some payment processor instead of just the usual "double click to apple pay", there is a very high chance i will just change my mind.

wraptile• 3 years ago

What if you got 30% discount? 2 minutes of work. If that didn't work Apple wouldn't spend so much effort fighting this.

hyuuu• 3 years ago

apple just has really good marketing and massive support from its fanboys, compared to the olden days of Microsoft monopolistic behavior, Microsoft is less shiny with less loyal foot soldiers.

epistasis2• 3 years ago

Just wait until you see what you have to do to get your food product onto super market shelves...

And grocery stores are not even considered a monopoly!

Edit: which is not say that there should be an "is" vs. "ought" conflation. Just that it's unlikely that this situation is going to be changed through courts. Other routes: legislation and regulation to establish a new social norm, or as Jacquesm has been advocating here, collective bargaining. But as an App Store consumer, and a developer of other sorts of tools, I don't really care at all about the developer-Apple split and am not the least bit excited by whatever might happen should that switch to, say, 99% going to the developer. Even if developers dropped prices 30%, I would have a hard time caring!

maximus-decimus3• 3 years ago

But imagine buying your food directly from a farm and having to pay a 27% cut to the grocery store anyway.

chii• 3 years ago

a monopoly abusing its dominate market position

this is what happens when the company controls their platform. In the technical sense, it's not monopoly, but surely if you squint a bit, it looks like it.

This is why i am only ever going to produce web based apps. I will not buy into a platform - even android has the same issue, albeit less severe (only because google does not completely control the android ecosystem).

awinter-py• 3 years ago

baller move for stripe would be to discount the 30%, get all IAP traffic, and then stop paying

alephnan2• 3 years ago

If you don't like making $6.71, the alternative is to make $0 by not selling it on the Apple app store.

saintfire• 3 years ago

Isn't that a defining trait of a monopoly position?

"If you don't like it then alternative is your target market is cut by over 50%"

Not a great argument. When you essentially have the say as to whether a company can afford to exist then you have serious control over a "free" market.

MobileVet2• 3 years ago

I am curious if any businesses operating with the ‘pay Apple their cut’ on outside sales actually do?

Does Apple have the manpower to chase every developer for that fee? Do they really expect to collect it or is it more of a threat?

Any HN people with first hand knowledge of a business paying that fee?

pests• 3 years ago

If Apple can track your outside sales they can just deduct it from any Apple Store payments. So maybe not exactly a chase for that portion of it.

judge20204• 3 years ago

Apple likely has a pretty good idea of how many downloads you have, and if users enable "Share with Apple Developers" in settings -> privacy -> analytics, their App Store Connect database definitely has usage and open analytics. Mobile app games likely won't be able to claim "we only made $30k this month on iOS" if they have >1M downloads a month or 100k app opens a day, for example.

MobileVet2• 3 years ago

Good point. Forgot that they have all the data…

clarle• 3 years ago

It is more for the other bigger corporations that will have more to lose, and will be flagged via outside auditors, that will pay it accurately.

kmeisthax2• 3 years ago

Given the zeal Apple has for their 30%, they absolutely will be demanding fully open books and tracking for that outbound link.

There's no firsthand knowledge because this is the first time Apple's actually had to chase companies for the fee. In fact, their whole argument against Epic was that banning steering made it easier on both parties to attribute revenue.

ing33k2• 3 years ago

Privacy can take backseat ?

madeofpalk• 3 years ago

People are focusing on the 27% cut, but a page worth of restrictions on how you’re allowed to link to your own website is just complete bullshit.

In accordance with the entitlement agreement, the link may inform users about where and how to purchase those in-app purchase items, and the fact that such items may be available for a comparatively lower price

The fact that you must apply for permission to tell your users that you even have off-app purchase items is bullshit.

Apple’s welcome to make the rules of their own platform (within reason), but it’s garbage that developers aren’t even able to say the rules exist. If Apple believes they’re so right and just, why must they leave users uninformed?

What’s the good faith argument for any of this? I want to see Craig Federighi on stage at WWDC announcing and this revolutionary new "link" API, demoing how great the scary warning screens are.

llm_nerd• 3 years ago

This feels like a straw that breaks the camel's back kind of moment. Apple has gotten away with a tremendous amount (being an astonishingly greedy company. All companies are de facto greedy, but Apple is just next level in its egregious entitlement), but there is simply zero way this stands.

And FWIW, I'm an Apple fan and find Tim S a completely unsympathetic character. But seeing the hilariously absurd lengths that people will go to justify Apple's outrageous greed grows old.

stevage4• 3 years ago

Zero way? This will totally stand for a few years at least.

lolinder12• 3 years ago

The details of the process of getting approval for links may be out of line, but the idea that simply using a different payment processor would remove the entirety of the 30% commission was always a pipe dream. Apple has always been adamant that the fee is for the service of using the App Store, not the payment processor, and that you owe them for sales made regardless of whether they're able to take the money directly out of your revenue stream.

That part of this outcome was inevitable, and I don't think any court will rule against it. It was even anticipated in the original ruling:

First, and most significant, as discussed in the findings of facts, IAP is the method by which Apple collects its licensing fee from developers for the use of Apple’s intellectual property. Even in the absence of IAP, Apple could still charge a commission on developers. It would simply be more difficult for Apple to collect that commission.

aCoreyJ• 3 years ago

That's precisely what gets them in trouble though. Every bank, credit card, giant corporation has an app and has to pay Apple nothing but indie game developers subsidize them

jussaying2• 3 years ago

Apple has always been adamant that the fee is for the service of using the App Store, not the payment processor

So charge developers for the service of using the App Store, perhaps with a per-download cost. To "give away" the service of the App Store only to recuperate your costs (and then some) via payment processing is just daylight robbery.

makeitdouble3• 3 years ago

＞ the idea that simply using a different payment processor would remove the entirety of the 30% commission was always a pipe dream

The idea wasn't to use third party processors as an argument to evade the fee, it was the other way round. Front and center Epic wanted to get rid of or strongly lower the fee, and as a consequence developers would probably have had to use other processors.

The judge shut this down by legitimizing Apple's 30%, which as a consequent allows Apple to collect that money however the dev processes their customers, third party PSP or not.

hyperbovine• 3 years ago

But seeing the hilariously absurd lengths that people will go to justify Apple's outrageous greed grows old.

Define greed. Seriously, I'm asking for an objective definition, not just ipse dixit.

They're charging what the market will bear for a _vastly_ better product (iOS vs. Android).

lxgr22• 3 years ago

Assuming iOS is really vastly better than Android: Isn’t it curious that Google is charging exactly the same rate then?

It’s just not an apples to oranges comparison: One vendor is forcing use of their distribution services; the other just strongly nudges their customers to stay within their walled garden and not enable sideloading.

makeitdouble3• 3 years ago

You're in the "greed" range when you're sued internationaly over how you deal with money and lose in at least one court, at least once.

Apple is in good company in this category.

makeitdouble3• 3 years ago

They're charging what the market will bear for a _vastly_ better product (iOS vs. Android).

I wonder how you see Qualcomm, being the crushing leader of mobile modem chips.

dmitrygr• 3 years ago

Does a gas station “get away” with charging for gas? They are selling a service and can charge anything they want for it. You are free not to use it, as is anyone else.

lxgr22• 3 years ago

That would be true in a completely unregulated market only.

In many countries, antitrust regulators set some limits to how far companies can take their “take it or leave it” approach and in many cases require companies to provide a certain service, sometimes even at a certain rate.

Forcing companies to unbundle products or services is another common measure.

kalleboo• 3 years ago

You are free not to use it

I'm not really though. I need to use either an Apple or a Google phone to participate in society.

3jjj3jjj3• 3 years ago

"being an astonishingly greedy company" and then writing "I'm an Apple fan" ... sound like a Stockholm syndrome or a cognitive dissonance

lxgr22• 3 years ago

Why? I can a company’s stock, use their products, and still strongly disagree with some of their business practices.

ralmidani4• 3 years ago

It’s called “nuance”. Also, Stockholm Syndrome is the opposite of what you’re objecting to; someone is taken hostage and sympathizes with the hostage takers.

newsclues2• 3 years ago

Was the situation for phone software developers better before the iPhone?

ralmidani4• 3 years ago

And FWIW, I'm an Apple fan and find Tim S a completely unsympathetic character. But seeing the hilariously absurd lengths that people will go to justify Apple's outrageous greed grows old.

Heh, there are still folks who actually grasp nuance… I have an iPhone, despise Apple in general, but consider their business disputes on a case-by-case basis. So for example, Apple is right to ignore Facebook’s plea to be allowed to track users, and simultaneously wrong in its App Store monopolistic money-grabbing.

satvikpendem• 3 years ago

Generally for Apple, I like their hardware, not their software. It's why I have a MacBook but also an Android phone, because I like their battery life but also because I can install whatever software I want, on either.

gepardi• 3 years ago

Is it enough to make you stop using Apple products? I’m considering it.

babypuncher4• 3 years ago

It's not like Google or Samsung are even remotely better.

Given the scary things Samsung gets away with in South Korea, I almost want to say they're worse than Apple.

app_boi92• 3 years ago

Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong on this. Consider the following scenario:

Developer puts out ads on Facebook (or some other way of getting traffic). Traffic flows to the developer's checkout page, where they buy access to in app content on an external website. Then they are linked to the app store where they can download the app and access the content.

Apple is paid no commission on this transaction. They only require commissions paid when the customer is sent to the website FROM the app store and checks out within 7 days.

If this is in fact true, then payment / support service recommendations would be great to hear right now!!

az2264• 3 years ago

I think 30% commissions for Apple are fair if the customer found the app through the app store. If they clicked a deep link that took them to the app directly, the commission should be much lower like 10%. And in categories where Apple has competing digital services it should always be 3% to not be anti-competitive.

ksec• 3 years ago

What a bloody pile of mess. In order to guard their interest, and everyone wants a pieces of it, now we have an Apple ecosystem that is... just ugly. And it is only gong to get worse.

I often wonder had Apple lowered their In-App purchase to 10% would we still have the same problem.

Hikikomori2• 3 years ago

If you are are ok with this you should also be ok with Apple taking a cut on anything you buy with their browser, why not also take a fee for any data going in and out of your phone.

smoldesu9• 3 years ago

Don't threaten Apple with a profitable idea.

klabb34• 3 years ago

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again. If the web was invented today browsers would never be allowed on the App Store. Not even a dumbed down version without advanced scripting capabilities.

The fact that they have a browser and allow “3p browsers” is only because the web was already established and customers wouldn’t have bought in without it.

iPhones and iPads are not general purpose computing devices. Not by tech, but by policy.

radley4• 3 years ago

Technically, third-party browsers are NOT allowed. The only browsers allowed are built using Apple's "open-source" WebKit.

rootusrootus2• 3 years ago

I feel like a lot of people have forgotten that we had proprietary services before the web became a thing. E.g. Compuserve, Prodigy.

srcreigh• 3 years ago

Keeping in mind what a browser could have been in 2024 if Apple hadn't disallowed/slowed innovation, it's fair to say browsers aren't allowed on the App Store.

cubefox• 3 years ago

Meanwhile: https://www.macrumors.com/2024/01/15/app-store-to-be-split-i...

matt3210• 3 years ago

I’m not leaving the app to pay…

kevingadd2• 3 years ago

Apple already forces you to sometimes, for example if you want to buy a Kindle e-book.

riscy18• 3 years ago

Amazon forces their users to leave the app, not Apple.

GeekyBear2• 3 years ago

At this point, it's worth remembering that one of the points on which Epic lost was Apple's right to take a cut of transactions.

I found this discussion of the Apple v. Epic ruling to be informative:

as discussed in the findings of facts, IAP is the method by which Apple collects its licensing fee from developers for the use of Apple’s intellectual property. Even in the absence of IAP, Apple could still charge a commission on developers. It would simply be more difficult for Apple to collect that commission.

Indeed, while the Court finds no basis for the specific rate chosen by Apple (i.e., the 30% rate) based on the record, the Court still concludes that Apple is entitled to some compensation for use of its intellectual property.

https://stratechery.com/2021/the-apple-v-epic-decision/

The judge hinted here and there that Epic should have sued over the size of Apple's cut, not it's right to take a cut.

threeseed8• 3 years ago

Epic should have sued over the size of Apple's cut, not it's right to take a cut

Epic charges 5% for Unreal Engine.

Apple offers developers significantly more than just a games engine.

throwaway2906• 3 years ago

The most famous Epic game is (or was until this legal battle) played on iOS more than on any other platform, that's in Epic's own complaint. So who built iOS? Why so many people use it? How come they are willing to pay for games instead of pirating them?

Looks like whoever developed iOS and all the hardware it runs on and the ecosystem that makes it appealing for rich users is actually providing Epic a ton of value and profit, but Epic doesn't want to pay for it. I wonder who's greedy here

(Also it's insane how we just accept that Epic with its massive profits and margins is the one who wants to get a discount from Apple, if anything they should be charged double what small business single person devs pay.)

choppaface• 3 years ago

But use of said IP is required because Apple forbids side-loading. Therefore Apple App store is a monopoly. So hopefully the court result will in the end help get the Apple App store shut down / opened up.

sircastor3• 3 years ago

Some people think of the App Store as a bazaar that Apple runs on its property, and it’s a 15-30% charge to setup a tent and sell your wares. Others think of it as Apple’s general store where they carry your app as a product, and you pay 15-30% for a place on the shelf.

The concept that Kroger (for instance) has a monopoly of customers in its own store is ridiculous. There are other stores, and other bazaars.

What analogy would you use to describe this situation that clarifies your position?

AdamJacobMuller2• 3 years ago

Even if you're side-loading, you're still using Apple IP.

Every single framework and the OS itself up to the Mach OSS Kernel is Apple IP.

It would be entirely unfeasible to run anything on an iPhone without some Apple IP. You'd be looking at an Asahi Linux for iPhone.

nodamage5• 3 years ago

Therefore Apple App store is a monopoly.

Not under US law according to the very court case being discussed.

Why are people still making this claim when the judge literally concluded otherwise and then a panel of appeals court judges confirmed her ruling?

mmcnl2• 3 years ago

Then Epic might've won the battle but lost the war. I don't think this is the end.

pms• 3 years ago

It sounds to me the exact opposite.

Apple's bad-faith compliance will backfire. Enough of this.

mvdtnz3• 3 years ago

This is absolutely outrageous. I simply cannot believe people still support this awful company.

kemayo3• 3 years ago

This is the same strategy that Apple pursued for dating apps in the Netherlands, after a court there forced them to allow third-party payments a year or two ago. Their argument is that the 15/30% is a general fee for use of their infrastructure (App Store, etc), and so they'll subtract the approximate cost of payment processing if you're handling it yourself but you'll still have to pay the rest of the fee to them.

Although I think this sounds extremely petty-bullshit of them, in part because that flat 3% is basically calculated to make this cost more for developers who do this overall, the court in the Netherland did go along with it. So we'll have to see how it'll work out under US courts now.

(I feel that them charging some sort of fee for the App Store isn't entirely unreasonable, though this seems too high -- we can debate the actual amount that'd be acceptable. It's the lack of an alternative via sideloading that makes this egregious.)

onethought7• 3 years ago

What’s the egregious bit? Because Apple were so successful with their product they should have a cap on how much they capitalise?

Do you get upset at business class in airlines? Or cinema food being so expensive? Isn’t this the point of capitalism?

kemayo3• 3 years ago

Leaving aside the potential for a critique of capitalism as a whole... it depends on what you compare it to, right? (Or, I don't get upset at the existence of business class, but I do get upset at excessive nickel-and-diming with fees in coach.)

I'd tend to think of the Mac as the most-direct comparison point, where there's the App Store but also where a developer who wants to handle everything themselves can.

threeseed8• 3 years ago

Their argument is that the 15/30% is a general fee for use of their infrastructure

No Apple's argument is that this is a fee for everything e.g. SDKs.

As well as being a highly lucrative distribution channel.

kemayo3• 3 years ago

I felt a lot could be covered under "etc", I'll admit. :D

OsrsNeedsf2P• 3 years ago

It's the same thing here in Korea. I'm implementing a 3rd party payment processor for a client right now - same 27% fee. However, the revenue is "self reported". Allegedly, most companies lie.

htrp• 3 years ago

You lie until you get big enough that it warrants an audit.

the_gastropod• 3 years ago

It really feels like Apple keeps making these unforced errors. While they're working to hype up their new product launch coming up, giving prominent tech journalists early access / hands-on demos to stir up some good press, they pull shit like this completely destroying any good feelings people may have about the brand.

I don't get it. Absolutely greedy and (seemingly?) short-sighted.

siliconc0w• 3 years ago

I hope the US copies EU regulation and puts a stop to this BS. Imagine a world where the companies hoarding capital and talent have to actually compete rather than sit back and collect rent.

jsyang00• 3 years ago

Why not just force apps to collect payment through a money order sent on the 2nd Thursday of each month between 1 and 2pm. Sounds about as compelling.

rkagerer• 3 years ago

What we need is a third-party appstore, for BOTH platforms (iOS and Android), that offers curated titles and filtering options users actually want (e.g. like by "ad-free" and "no in-app purchases").

If something like that had been in incubation and available for lawyers to draw on for their arguments I wonder if it would have impacted the case (especially when judge says things like "failed to prove the existence of substantially less restrictive alternatives").

poundofshrimp2• 3 years ago

To see why Apple’s mandatory commissions are absurd, compare phones to desktop computers. There is no fundamental difference between the two. So, why is it okay to install whatever you want and pay for it directly on desktops, but on phones it is not?

The “better security” argument just doesn’t make sense in this context.

charcircuit10• 3 years ago

So, why is it okay to install whatever you want and pay for it directly on desktops, but on phones it is not?

On desktop you have similar stores like Steam. The store takes a 30% cut from all sales on the platform and they require apps on the platform to use their payment processing so that they can take that cut.

The difference between Windows and iOS here is that third party stores can be installed without being limited to PWAs or requiring hacky workarounds like AltStore.

Why does Apple have the sole app store on the device? Well it's because it ensures they have a closed platform that they fully control. They made this app platform so it's up to them to decide how open it should be from a range of first party only to fully open to any app from the internet. It's up to Apple to decide what kind of openness will allow them to provide the most value to users. Apple designs their app platform from the hardware all the way up to the operating system and libraries for developers to use. Apple has created a great app platform that brings value to a lot of users.

sundvor2• 3 years ago

PC platform: Steam doesn't care if (case in point) Eagle Dynamics allows direct downloads from their website of DCS World - in fact they embrace it, by offering account linking APIs.

So on PCs, unlike on iOS, users can buy their content as they choose.

And it's not as if Microsoft forces everyone to use their (exceptionally crappy) store either.

maximus-decimus3• 3 years ago

Steam has a literal button on your library's page to add any game you have already installed and the definitely don't charge you 27% to do that.

fenomas6• 3 years ago

Steam. ... they require apps on the platform to use their payment processing

That's not true at all. Steam literally lets you sell steam keys for your game from other stores, and takes no cut from those sales.

https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys

zerohp• 3 years ago

Compare phones to game consoles.

stouset• 3 years ago

Apple is hosting, distributing, and directly marketing apps in the app store. They are reviewing submitted apps for compliance with their policies and security requirements.

If you want to compare it to desktop computers, great! Compare it to the macOS App Store which… takes a 30% commission.

Whether or not you personally agree that 30% is a reasonable fee, you can't simply deny that operating the app store costs money and resources. Further, it isn't unreasonable for them to try to recoup those costs or even to make some profit off of providing the service.

eblanshey• 3 years ago

But they don't allow alternate app stores.

justinclift3• 3 years ago

Apple is hosting, distributing, and directly marketing apps in the app store.

Isn't that a forced situation though, unlike with macOS?

With macOS anyone can throw an application on a website (GitHub, etc) and the users can download the application and run it.

To get rid of the scary warnings, there's even a $99 dev membership that can be used to sign the macOS binaries.

iOS developers don't have any choices to host their binaries elsewhere though.

The EU "allow side loading" thing might allow for some improvement there (hopefully), but I'm not sure.

willsmith723• 3 years ago

Apple is hosting, distributing, and directly marketing apps in the app store. They are reviewing submitted apps for compliance with their policies and security requirements.

They CHOOSE to do this. If there were a free and open market for app stores, competitors would pop up, who would similarly host, distribute, market, and "review" apps. And they would do it for a whole lot less than 30% and 99USD/year.

They charge 30% and restrict other installation methods because they can, but you cannot justify it based on those costs.

I firmly believe this model isn't going to last. If it didn't hurt Apple's bottom line so much, PWAs would be far more prevalent already than they are, and that's right now. In 10-20 years, this thinking will be gone. They just have to milk it as a long as they can for the shareholders.

It's their hardware, for now they can do what they want. Most consumers didn't even know about the 30%, and probably still don't. Guess who it benefits to keep that under wraps? Or convince the world they need an expensive app store to vet their apps before downloading them?

(And don't say "there's nothing like a native app experience". It's completely irrelevant. If there was a will to build it, the UX would be identical)

CubsFan10602• 3 years ago

If there is no fundamental difference, then did you just define the market as all phones, tablets, and pcs? If so the the iPhone is a small minority and can’t possibly be forced to change anything, right? You can just replace your iPhone with a pc if you want to install things?

poundofshrimp2• 3 years ago

Both phone and desktop consumers can install third-party apps on their devices. From this point of view, there is no fundamental difference. Yet, on desktops, people are free to install freely, but on the iPhone, Apple controls all third-party installations.

etchalon3• 3 years ago

It's OK because that's just how it worked out.

One platforms norms developed before the internet and one developed after.

sircastor3• 3 years ago

There is no fundamental difference between the two.

Are the input devices the same? The screens sizes? The situations you use them? The means of network connectivity? The social conventions around them?

There are tremendous differences between phones and desktop computers. Really the only way that they’re not different is that they’re both Von Neumann machines. But that describes so many things around us these days that it’s a distinction without a difference. By the same virtue a modern television is no different.

jbverschoor3• 3 years ago

Exactly what I thought. Makes total sense.. 3% for payments. I’m surprised anyone is surprised as this is what was discussed many times

nsagent2• 3 years ago

I've got to say, Apple definitely lost me on this one. This feels bad enough that despite having an iPhone since the iPhone 3G, I'll likely jump ship when I need to upgrade unless they make a U-turn on this move.

EDIT: Wow, getting downvoted for saying Apple is losing me as a customer with this move is surprising. I don't understand how people on Hacker News of all places want conformity of thought. I switched from using Microsoft products to Apple when Vista came out. Microsoft lost my trust by that point and Macs were a viable alternative. Despite having a Macbook, iPhone, and an Apple Watch it seems like Apple is starting to lose me with this move.

samtheprogram3• 3 years ago

You haven’t daily driven Android since at least the iPhone 3GS, according to your comment. There’s a reason they’re able to charge 30%, have a dominant market position in the US, and people continue to release apps for iOS (and prioritize launching there over Android).

You’re also not the customer in this situation — you’re talking not as a developer but as an end-user without any mention of a subscription service that you pay more for because you’re on iOS, or mention of an app you want to side load.

And, you might switch back to iOS after experiencing Android. Your comment says basically nothing, except that you got rattled by reading the news. It doesn’t have to do with “conformity of thought”.

Also, editing to complain about downvoting is just asking to get more downvotes.

_gabe_• 3 years ago

There’s a reason they’re able to charge 30%, have a dominant market position in the US, and people continue to release apps for iOS (and prioritize launching there over Android).

I keep seeing this line of thinking in the comments (some may say these comments are conforming to a specific line of thought). When is the last time you used a modern android (Galaxy, Pixel, etc)? And really used it, not just tried to use your friend’s Android for a few minutes and then gave up?

I kept reading all these comments about how superior iPhones are on Hacker News. So after having used a MacBook (and being very happy with it over the past year) I bought an iPhone 14 to see if the iPhone also lived up to the hype. It doesn’t. It’s literally the same as an Android. There are no significant differences.

The gestures are a difference, but I kind of hate that about iPhones. You’re just supposed to somehow know these from tribal knowledge or reading something from some random thread (just violently shake the phone to undo typing, very intuitive!). After a couple months of use, I’m finally almost as good at using an iPhone as I was at using my Android. And once again, there are no significant differences. Of course, there’s a learning curve when you switch. But that should be expected. Give it 2 months, and then the devices will feel identical. They’re different, but in the end, they’re pretty much the same.

Edit: and btw, the same exact line of thinking can be used for Android. There’s a reason Google sets their App Store fee at 30%, and Android leads the market globally, and people continue to launch apps on Android.

rustcleaner8• 3 years ago

GrapheneOS on Pixel makes 98% of Android problems go away. Just side-load F-Droid from the initially secure and barren state, install Aurora and Syncthing from F-Droid, configure Syncthing to pair with a PC partner (gives you that cloud feeling), and you have the absolute basics for a feature-equivalent Android device without all the rentier-model enforcement which comes on Soisung devices. If you need Google-stuff, GSF is available fully sandboxed and you can use Android profiles to highly isolate if so desired.

There is no good reason which comes to my mind to go with anything else if a sane, secure, privacy- and sovereignty-respecting mobile device is what you are after. 98% of devices are just beautiful overpriced subscription and microtransaction cash-traps. Just like setting a snare in the wild to catch a rabbit, Apple (and competitors) have constructed a beautifully seductive snare for you!

issung• 3 years ago

Forgive the unrelated reply, but can you actually downvote on this site? I only have an up arrow next to everything.

nsagent2• 3 years ago

See https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented#downvo...

nickloewen• 3 years ago

You can downvote comments after accruing a certain amount of karma (see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html)

turquoisevar10• 3 years ago

People seem to be very poorly informed and are up in arms over the 27%.

This is directly part of the underlying court decisions.

While the courts haven’t explicitly stated a percentage, and the initial judge questioned the percentage, it was made clear by both the district court as well as the appeals court that Apple can still charge a commission even when payment takes place outside of Apple’s IAP system.

The courts consider it payment for Apple’s IP that’s directly tied to the sales, not IAP:

“In essence, Apple uses the DPLA to license its IP to developers in exchange for a $99 fee and an ongoing 30% commission on developers' iOS revenue.”

The district court even went as far as to outright state Apple’s entitlement to a commission, despite hemming and hawing about the exact rate (and ultimately not making a decision on it):

“Even in the absence of IAP, Apple could still charge a commission on developers. It would simply be more difficult for Apple to collect that commission”

“Indeed, while the Court finds no basis for the specific rate chosen by Apple (i.e., the 30% rate) based on the record, the Court still concludes that Apple is entitled to some compensation for use of its intellectual property.”

“Apple is entitled to license its intellectual property for a fee, and to further guard against the uncompensated use of its intellectual property. The requirement of usage of IAP accomplishes this goal in the easiest and most direct manner, whereas Epic Games' only proposed alternative would severely undermine it. Indeed, to the extent Epic Games suggests that Apple receive nothing from in-app purchases made on its platform, such a remedy is inconsistent with prevailing intellectual property law.”

“Suffice it to say, IAP is not merely a payment processing system, as Epic Games suggests, but a comprehensive system to collect commission and manage in-app payments.”

The appellate court echoed these sentiments, if not outright making stronger statements about this, while at the same time complaining between the lines that the district court wanted its cake and eat it too by insisting that the anti-steering provisions are not kosher while simultaneously stating that it would be too cumbersome for Apple to retroactively audit sales to collect their commission.

Either way, the long and short of it is that Apple collecting a commission from developers using third party payment processors has the blessing of the courts.

Even when the district court in particular isn’t entirely happy with the rate of the commission while simultaneously not willing to make an official determination on the rate because Epic never fought the rate, rather the existence of the commission itself.

Now that SCOTUS has declined to look at it, this situation, including the blessing to collect a commission even when using third party payment processors, is the law of the land.

rustcleaner8• 3 years ago

The only real recourse seems to be shaming Apple customers in to no longer wanting to be associated with the brand. My personal flavor of this memetic warfare is to equate such customers to high time preference, shallow beauty-seeking rubes with too much money. Probably doesn't work too well, but it's what I got until I think up something better!

jjcm• 3 years ago

So I'm about to embark on a submission process for an iOS app that has a subscription currently, and I'm wondering if any app store pros can give advice, especially in light of this.

The app is a reddit-like site where you subscribe for an amount you choose (say $10/mo), the site takes a $1 cut, and the remaining $9 gets distributed between everything you upvote that month (creators get sent this money into their stripe connect account).

How much does Apple take as part of this? Do they take 27% of the $1/mo server fee, or 27% of the $10/mo total (thus taking away from money users would be sending from each other)?

It's a weird situation because it ends up being a subscription-based digital wallet, and I'm unsure how these are treated or what the right approach is when submitting the app.

jagged-chisel• 3 years ago

Until you hit $1million in revenue, it’s 15%. And it’s 15% on all the money you collect. Because these are digital services and not physical products, Apple takes their cut. You will need to factor that into your business model.

It doesn’t matter how you distribute the money on your end. While you can definitely reflect the exact amounts involved to your customers, it might be wise to convert incoming money to something else, perhaps simply “credits.”

thrdbndndn• 3 years ago

For me, the glaring issue here is not whether 27% is fair or not. Rather, it's the absence of an alternative method to do so without relying on Apple's "services."

Naturally, there can be endless debates about whether this is acceptable or not. However, the reality is that there is a striking disparity between the iOS's model and that of Android, PC, or even Mac.

ijhuygft776• 3 years ago

The main problem is censorship by apple on the "app" store... everything else is smoke and mirrors, including money.

bearjaws• 3 years ago

Its far worse than that. Apple clearly abuses its market place "railroads" to control shipments of apps "oil" from its competitors, mainly Kindle and Spotify. Of course while offering the same apps at a much higher margin for themselves.

It's literally the same problem that led to antitrust in 1890.

jongjong• 3 years ago

I always hated native apps and found them to be very high friction, both as a user and as a developer. I have no idea what's wrong with people. Why are people so keen to install untrusted, intrusive software onto their devices when they can access them in the safety of their browser without downloading anything. When I was younger, people were very careful about what software they installed on their machines, you'd have to be insane to opt to install some software if you could just run it directly from a browser. Aside from a few niche use cases where the app needs access to device sensors, it really doesn't make sense.

With Apple, I feel like people are under some kind of spell. I cannot relate to their behavior. It's ironic that they've become exactly what they were claiming to be working against in their 1984 advert. It's has become some kind of big brother mind control operation.

brandon272• 3 years ago

App makers (and often users!) want dedicated buttons for services or apps they use on their phone home screens or menus. Apple has put considerable effort into having a standardized workflow that most users understand when it comes to installing a mobile app on their device: you access it through their App Store.

I would love for Progressive Web Apps to be normalized, and PWAs can do a lot, and you can also get a button for a PWA on your home screen, but the process to do so is odd/cumbersome, requires explanation for inexperienced users, which is not something that most companies that want a well-positioned mobile app are willing to tolerate.

And while PWAs on iOS can access some sensors, the API support is limited[0] and in some cases not supported at all. Not being able to capture links to properly direct users into installed PWAs, not being able to provide install prompts, background sync, etc. are considered serious limitations to people who are used to those luxuries available to actual iOS apps.

[0] https://firt.dev/notes/pwa-ios/

isurujn• 3 years ago

iOS user and a developer here. I actually feel the opposite. With native apps, there are OS level restrictions to accessing certain resources and sensors on the device so I feel safer in a native app than a browser.

kazinator2• 3 years ago

How is it non-app store purchasing if Apple still gets the commission?

If Apple gets commission, the sale took place on Apple's cyberturf, all of which can be identified as being their app store.

The user's Apple device where they made this purchase is effectively a branch location of the that store.

az2264• 3 years ago

It's malicious compliance. It's non-app store purchase but Apple still gets to keep a 27% net cut. Had Apple made no commissions on those sales it would have still been super onerous but at least then people can "buy" the degraded experience if there is a savings to be had for the customer.

kazinator2• 3 years ago

malicious compliance

Nice term; it is fortuitously applicable in another ongoing HN thread.

apple4ever• 3 years ago

Utterly ridiculous for Apple to do this. It's so consumer unfriendly.

chubs• 3 years ago

One interesting thing to me is that apple has now put a price tag on their payments processing: 3% (being the discount of this 27% vs the normal 30%). Their payments are pretty convenient, i'm surprised they don't consider it worth eg 4-5%.

So they're basically saying that their SDKs (+ distribution) are worth 27% of sales.

I wonder if one could make the argument in court that if you don't use their SDK, eg you use react native or flutter, you shouldn't pay 27%. Yes, i know those frameworks still use apple's SDKs, but they commoditise them such that you might make the argument these SDKs aren't worth any more than any other sdk such as android.

(I'm skipping distribution in my argument too, for simplicity's sake)

dang• 3 years ago

Related ongoing thread:

US Supreme Court declines to hear appeals in Apple-Epic Games legal battle - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39014642 - Jan 2024 (162 comments)

belter• 3 years ago

"Supreme Court rebuffs Apple's appeal on app payments" - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39021897

toasterlovin3• 3 years ago

Some perspective: we sell on Amazon as a 3rd party seller. Amazon takes about 9% of the sale price of our products as their commission (it’s actually 12%, but includes credit card processing). To which you might be inclined to reply, “Ah, but 9% is a reasonable commission, so that’s okay.” But we sell physical goods, which cost money to produce. It’s typical for our products to have 20-25% gross margins. So as a share of what’s left after accounting for the cost to produce and transport our products, Amazon’s commission is similar to Apple’s App Store fee.

Just something to think about if you want to argue that a 30% commission is too much for facilitating a high trust purchasing environment with customers who are ready to spend money.

Oh yeah, and you’ll never guess what Amazon’s policy is about steering customers off of Amazon.

mikercampbell• 3 years ago

Are they toasters? Because I hear there might be some competition.

But genuinely, your comments enrich this sort of thing. I love your input.

janalsncm2• 3 years ago

That’s just the commission on the sale itself. It doesn’t count FBA or advertising fees which in practical terms are often necessary. After all is said and done, Amazon is usually taking much more than 9%.

toasterlovin3• 3 years ago

Yeah, exactly, but I wanted to compare like for like: just the commission on the sale. You can also pay for ads on the App Store, which would be in addition to Apple’s 30% take.

malshe2• 3 years ago

I know a few vendors who sell on Amazon. With advertising, they end up paying close to 60% of the selling price to Amazon.

stefandesu• 3 years ago

How can Amazon pricing be so competitive if the cut is so large for third-party vendors?

jy1• 3 years ago

There's plenty of digital goods with low margins that apple forces a 30% cut.

e.g. Spotify, Twitch, Patreon etc. Most of the funds go to the creator. Completely breaks the model when Apple forces a 30% cut of gross.

That being said, i'd also argue Apple's app store is a complete monopoly on iPhones. Iphones and app stores are such an essential part of life, they deserve to be neutral a la internet neutrality. Not sure how we all become pro internet neutrality but somehow suffer Apple's 30% tax.

interpol_p6• 3 years ago

I don't think you can sign up for Spotify using in-app-purchase. Once you're in the app it says:

"You can't upgrade to premium in the app. We know, it's not ideal"

You have to go to their site to upgrade your account. Apple gets a 0% cut of Spotify's subscription revenue

guax2• 3 years ago

I think the difference is that amazon is not a platform. You sell on Amazon because it is where everyone is and they did that by burning lots and lots of cash to ensure everyone margins cannot be larger than a paper atom.

Now that they're trying to capitalize on it they're becoming worse as a store and I can't remember last time I used them (in NL).

If you buy an iphone there is no one to compete, Apple does not have to play the low margins game because there is no other game in town. Amazon does not take 9% if you sell somewhere else and does not care if you sell cheaper elsewhere, Apple does.

shaan7• 3 years ago

If you buy an iphone there is no one to compete

This. The problem is not the 30%, the problem is that iPhones do not have an option to buy apps from, lets say a Amazon Store or Epic Store.

toasterlovin3• 3 years ago

Amazon does not take 9% if you sell somewhere else

So we do sell on other e-commerce platforms and you’re never gonna guess what their fee structures are.

(Basically the same as Amazon’s)

SixDouble5321• 3 years ago

Amazon... ...does not care if you sell cheaper elsewhere

I can't find a good source for it, but Amazon is very sensitive to prices for the same goods on other sites. My understanding is they automatically match lowered prices on a number of competitors. They are also getting sued by the FTC[1] for punishing sellers that sell lower elsewhere.

1. https://www.businessinsider.com/how-amazon-forces-customers-...

lozenge2• 3 years ago

Amazon customers are still available on other platforms. They use credit cards and they can put their details into any site, and I imagine most of them frequently do. Their shipping address is also accepted by every company.

iPhone users don't carry a second Android phone, and their purchasing decision has committed them to only buying on the App Store for at least a few years at a time. And the crazy part is they are paying the Apple Tax even for services like Spotify that they might primarily consume on other devices. You can't make a store that ships to Apple users - only Apple can.

dwaite10• 3 years ago

I'm not quite getting your point.

The parent seems to be saying that when you take the difference between physical and digital goods into account, that Amazon is leaving him with a similar slice of the revenue.

You seem to be arguing that he has alternatives to Amazon.

However, you also seem to be making the point indirectly that the motivation for selling on Amazon, and why businesses sell in the App Stores, is that they want the additional sales that come from targeting those marketplaces.

Isn't then there little real distinction from selling products on Amazon (where you could sell elsewhere, but dramatically fewer would see and purchase your product) or the App Store (where you could make a web app and sell elsewhere, but dramatically fewer would see and purchase your product)?

interpol_p6• 3 years ago

Just a note that for my business (and many others) Apple takes a 15% cut

Apple will lower their cut to 15% if you earn less than $1 million USD/year across your app businesses, or if you sell subscriptions and your subscribers persist for longer than 1 year (so 2nd - Nth year of subscriptions are split at 85/15)

Not defending the size of their commission, but in practice it does vary from the 30% that is commonly quoted

silisili• 3 years ago

What that 9% buys you I guess is access to people like me. I'm not Amazon's biggest fan, but their protections and guarantees have always been solid to me. If it doesn't arrive, I get a replacement or refund. If it's broken, same. If it's junk, they'll take it back and issue a refund.

I've been burned by too many places to just start arbitrarily buying from someone I've never purchased from before directly. I've had companies just not respond, accuse me of stealing, tell me missing packages aren't their problem, charge enormous restocking fees, and in more than one case call me an idiot that doesn't know what I'm talking about. None of that with Amazon.

Maybe after establishing a relationship of being a reputable brand I could be swayed over, but even then there's no benefit to me unless the price is cheaper.

jijji2• 3 years ago

And Apple wonders why Android has 70% market share (and growing)

woutr_be• 3 years ago

Do you have a source for the growing numbers? On all accounts it seems to have plateaued, and even slightly down in the past 5 years - https://www.techrepublic.com/article/ios-vs-android-market-s...

jijji2• 3 years ago

the link you provided also clearly shows android global market share over 70% by 2022 estimates.... here is another research report that claims Android at 81% market share [0]

[0] https://www.counterpointresearch.com/insights/global-smartph...

backtoyoujim• 3 years ago

Does apple still charge people annually to develop apps for apple ?

Because charging people to charge them again to make Apple useful seems abusive.

xyst• 3 years ago

Once side loading finalizes (couple of years?) the predatory 27-30% fee will come down really fast. F Apple for this monopoly bs. From the anti-repair shenanigans to their locked down ecosystem. It’s all designed to pump as much money from the consumer AND developers inside the wall.

etchalon3• 3 years ago

I am willing to make a bet that even when side-loading becomes available, it does change much.

You can side-load on Android, and the Play Store's commissions are on par with Apple's.

The mistake here is believing that either Store is competing for developers. They are not. The stores compete for users, and they charge developers a fee for access to those users. Most users prefer the safety and convience of Play, or Steam, or Apple's iOS store.

So long as user's are primarily using Apple's store, either through defaults, habits or choice, Apple won't have to change much.

modeless• 3 years ago

There's no way Apple will capitulate on sideloading in the US. It's clear they are going to go every inch as far as the law allows to guarantee their 30%. They will strictly geofence sideloading to the EU, and they may even try to resist even more strongly by challenging DMA enforcement in court as long as they can before complying. And they'll probably pull more shenanigans like this to try to impose the 30% even on third party app stores.

kelnos13• 3 years ago

Why would they? Most iPhone users still won't install third-party stores, so, in practice, if you want to exist, you need to sell through the App Store.

Google allows third-party stores and side-loading, but they're still able to charge a 30% cut on the Play Store.

I personally make use of third-party stores and side-loading on Android, but I don't personally know anyone else who does.

bmitc3• 3 years ago

I don't understand this at all. How is this an improvement? This is effectively an in-app purchase just done through the browser instead. There seems to be no difference.

janalsncm2• 3 years ago

As an end user this isn’t great. One of the great things about Apple subscriptions is how easy it is to see them all in one place and to cancel them.

throw03172019• 3 years ago

Are there any details of how Apple actually collects that money? Self reporting? Only Apple Pay? What’s the process like?

FateOfNations• 3 years ago

Self-reporting. The developer will pay Apple periodically and is agrees to be subject to audit to verify compliance.

6510• 3 years ago

I'm kinda confused so I asked bing

The difference between self employed and employed is that123:
Self-employed workers work for themselves as sole proprietors or independent contractors, while employees work for an organization under a contract of service.
Self-employed workers have more control over their work, but also more risks and responsibilities, while employees have more stability and benefits, but also more restrictions and obligations.
Self-employed workers pay their own taxes and expenses, while employees have their taxes withheld and their benefits provided by their employer.

Apple also withholds VAT for the "employee".

Don't get me wrong, legally they are not employees. The interesting thing is how much it is like employment. You work for a single company, you have to do as told, they can fire you at any moment. When that happens you wont be able to sell to your customers because they are not your customers.

encoderer• 3 years ago

Apple does provide a lot of value with the App Store. But when I compare it to my business (saas), adding stripe + aws is about 12% of sales. I feel for my App Store brethren. It would be hard to accept 30%

w10-12• 3 years ago

Unless you make over $1M/year, the commission for small business is 15%.

brcmthrowaway• 3 years ago

What is your business?

David_FF• 3 years ago

Maybe I missed it

But how will they actually know how much money developers are making via external web purchasing? Audits?

In my opinion working with both Apple and Google's billing libraries is pretty painful. Many developers use third parties to make it easier like Qonversion or RevenueCat. These all have to go through Apple and Google respectively

If you can just have a web page to do it, that seems easier actually. You can just save if the user is paid or not directly in your backend after they make a purchase

semiquaver• 3 years ago

  > Developers are required to provide a periodic accounting of qualifying out-of-app purchases, and Apple has a right to audit developers' accounting to ensure compliance with their commission obligations and to charge interest and offset payments.

talldatethrow• 3 years ago

Can someone give me the TLDR of this questions answer..

If I have a web based saas currently where I charge customers $300 a month.. if I were to make an iOS app for them to use, would apple want a % of that?

tebbers• 3 years ago

If you allow them to subscribe in the iOS app, then yes. Just don’t offer that option.

ISO-morphism• 3 years ago

As I couldn't find the nice page about the IAP policy that I read and found quite clear ~4 years ago (you should verify, don't trust people on the Internet): the old rules prior to the Epic and other court cases would say "Only for those users that set up payment while using the app." From what I gather, the current rules would be more lax, but the old can then serve as an upper bound.

The main rules were:

1) A user making a payment that has any effect on app functionality (this is very broad) from inside your app must go through Apple IAP (paying 30% commission). There were some exceptions, but mainly think buying physical goods - Apple isn't forcing the use of IAP for EBay or Amazon retail.

2) You may not link to, or even mention other payment methods.

Really it comes down to: if there is any difference in what the app will do for a user before and after they pay money then that money paying must go through Apple and then Apple will give it to you (minus 30%). So what a lot of apps did is just open to a login screen. No sign up button, no link to your homepage, heck, no links anywhere. The downside is that users have to know about your app from at least one more channel than searching on the App Store, but that's not a very high bar. Probably less common if you're B2B, but for B2C a lot of them would pay their subscription through Apple if possible, the experience is great: one central place in system settings showing all your subscriptions with easy cancellation buttons and enforced standard refund/proration semantics.

dns_snek11• 3 years ago

In my limited experience, payments for such services are handled outside the iOS app. Simultaneously you're prohibited from directing users to make a purchase on your website and it's up to you to fit this square peg in a round hole, usually through cryptic messages which vaguely remind your users that they have to buy the subscription elsewhere, wink wink.

sidkshatriya• 3 years ago

Amazon sells its Kindle books outside the Apple App Store. Once purchased, the book is available to view in your Kindle app. My guess is that Amazon doesn't pay Apple any $ for books sold there.

How is this current practice of Amazon consistent with the (new?) rules in which all sales taking place even outside the store will attract commision from Apple ?

It is because Kindle does not offer ANY sales at all through its own Apple app ? Some other reason ?

furyofantares• 3 years ago

To me it reads that you can place a link in-app to the out-of-app purchase, and purchases made through that route are subject to the fee.

gene91• 3 years ago

Based on my reading, Apple’s cut of non-IAP purchase only applies if you sign up for the new StoreKit External Purchase Link Entitlement, and the cut only applies for purchases through the Entitlement link.

riscy18• 3 years ago

The Play Store takes exactly same 15%/30% commission from their developers as the App Store that everyone here is venting about. The key thing is how their payment processing discounts work.

The Play Store offers a 4% discount on the commission for alternate payment processing only in India or South Korea [1]. In comparison, Apple is doing a 3% discount, but only in the US. Perhaps this will expand further to compete for discounts between the two stores?

[1] https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answ...

andersa• 3 years ago

It's incredible that there are actually people in this thread arguing in favor of Apple. You don't need to defend the trillion dollar company. They are not your friend, they do not care about you, your work or your life. All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer.

remus• 3 years ago

I also think apple's 30% cut is excessive, but I don't think this line of argument helps. We should discuss the points on their merits, not based on who's making them and how much money they have.

pompino6• 3 years ago

We should discuss the points on their merits, not based on who's making them and how much money they have.

Its not based on how much money they have. Its how they've managed to accumulate the money - by gouging devs.

pratnala• 3 years ago

I agree that Apple should take some cut but 30% is predatory and excessive.

nevir3• 3 years ago

Here's a little story / timeline from 2009-2010 (from my perspective as a dev on Kindle for iOS):

* we submit the Kindle app ...including an in-app bookstore... to Apple for initial app review

(Note: multiple ebook readers with in-app bookstores are already on the app store at this point)

* several weeks pass with no response

* Apple announces in-app purchasing (to be released several months later)

* Apple rejects our app: we have to give them a 30% cut of all sales through the app, or remove the store and all references / external links to it. We chose option 2.

* Apple forces the other ereader apps to remove their stores or go with IAP. Several (most?) just gave up and pulled their apps entirely

* Apple negotiates agreements with most of the major book publishers that if they want to sell books on iBooks, ebooks must be listed at the same price on ALL stores, and have a 30% margin

* Apple launches in-app purchasing and the iBooks store (with the iPad announcement, IIRC)

...aka even if we (or any other ereader app) wanted to sell books via our app, the terms Apple set forth effectively meant that ALL profit from those sales must go to them (and we would have to eat the bandwidth / service costs on top of that)

yMEyUyNE1• 3 years ago

I view such companies as Trolls under the Bridge (i.e. appstores) that connect the app developers and the users.

psychoslave• 3 years ago

If merit was a highly pondering factor of income, coal miners would be extremely rich and no annuitant would exist out there.

gigatexal3• 3 years ago

People also need to remember how it was before in the CompUSA or telco provided phones. The retailer or marketplace would take > 30% margins closer to 50% and to get on a pseudo-smart phone before the current smart phone era one had to ask the AT&T's and Verizon's very nicely. But now one can build apps now and publish and just pay the 30% comission or 15% on subscriptions after the second year and look at the explosion in the app marketplace.

nkrisc• 3 years ago

No, we can factor in who’s making them and how much money they have.

BriggyDwiggs42• 3 years ago

The merits are centered around the outcomes, which in this case are the consolidation of wealth by a few who don’t need it from the many who do. What other merits are more meaningful than the observable outcomes of the practice?

SOLAR_FIELDS• 3 years ago

Here’s a very simple example. Search ChatGPT in the App Store. The top result is an ad that’s not ChatGPT but looks extremely similar. The top 10 results are basically intended to look as much like the ChatGPT in name and logo as possible.

Ostensibly this 30% cut is supposed to prevent things like this from happening, as Apple argues it uses that money to keep the App Store clean from fraudulent or misrepresenting apps, among other things. There is a much touted “review” process that is supposed to be partially funded by the 30% cut.

So if that isn’t really happening, what, pray tell, is that 30% going towards? It isn’t making the App Store a better experience

taylorius• 3 years ago

Why shouldn't who's making a claim and their money be relevant? Monopolies (and near monopolies) are a bad thing for free markets.

sharemywin• 3 years ago

I think it's kind of the same argument. if you can justify an excessive marketplace tax for a company that "wins" in a wins a winner take all market dynamic then you get a $Trillion company. not sure how you get one without the other.

gunapologist99• 3 years ago

That's often true, but it's not a hard-and-fast rule, because we also have to look at the capabilities of the two combatants. It's why you would probably/hopefully assist the underdog who was being bullied.

We're talking about the wealthiest company in the world who can obviously afford to run out the clock on the court system and bury an opponent with legal fees. There's a monster difference of offensive capabilities, even if we realize that Epic is a sizeable company; in this case, Epic is really standing in for every other tiny company or one-man shop in the App Store, and we should thank them for doing that.

riscy18• 3 years ago

I've yet to see an HN hate thread about the trillion dollar company Google and its Play Store, with the same fees, stealing 30% from an even broader part of society.

hackernewds• 3 years ago

Au contraire I believe Google is the most hated company on HN by a mile and half. We see this play out IRL even with their anticompetitive lawsuit outcomes

account-53• 3 years ago

You clearly not been looking hard enough; Google, rightly, gets hated on way more than Apple. My experience tends to be that on HN apple can do no wrong.

dotnet002• 3 years ago

There are threads pretty much daily about how evil Google is.

throwaway20222• 3 years ago

First visit? Welcome!

conradfr• 3 years ago

The only difference is that you don't need to own an expensive Google device and pay $100 per year to develop for the Play Store, the 30% criticism applies as well though.

hyperhopper3• 3 years ago

Google doesn't force you to use Google Play and Google doesn't force devs to pay them. (Also they are still hated as well)

kelnos13• 3 years ago

While most people do install apps through the Play Store, Google doesn't lock down their platform to make it the only option. I have one alternative store (F-Droid) installed, and also have a couple apps side-loaded.

Google's 30% isn't the only option on Android. Apple's 30% is the only option on iOS.

Regardless, Google gets plenty of flak here for a variety of things, including how they run the Play Store.

charcircuit10• 3 years ago

All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes

This is how all businesses work. If there was no way to make profit then businesses would not exist. Apple spent billions of dollars creating an app platform with a clear monetization model that did not get in the way of them accumulating a lot of valuable apps and users. Developers are not forced to make apps for the platform nor are users forced to use the app platform. Other app platforms can impose lower fees and developers are free to release exclusively on those platforms if they wish. Apple hopes that the developers willing to tolerate the 15/30% fee for what the developer gets in return will be good enough to make their app platform competitive to users compared to others.

It's not just defending a trillion dollar company, it is defending the right to set your own prices.

totaa• 3 years ago

nor are users forced to use the app platform is side loading or alternative stores like f droid available on IOS?

flanked-evergl2• 3 years ago

Something is not moral just because it makes a profit or because it is legal, and revenue is also not profit. And I think if a company operates outside societal norms, which I think Apple with regards to European societal norms, it should expect to get regulated to fit those norms again. Maybe the US is too dysfunctional to do this any more, but the purpose of government should be to align the laws and regulations with the morals of the people being governed.

My bank generates revenue by offering me a service in return for my money, not by monopolizing access to my money and then charging people who want to sell to me for the honour of allowing me to buy their goods and services.

Very few companies that I deal with as a consumer have similar business practices, and the ones that do, like Visa and Mastercard, is also something I think should be cracked down upon.

There are many things the EU messes up in my opinion, but cracking down on this clearly immoral business practices is not one of those as it aligns 100% with my morals even though I'm incredibly pro "free" market (i.e. pro minimally regulated market, as every person who has ever been pro "free market" is).

DeathArrow13• 3 years ago

Apple spent billions of dollars creating an app platform with a clear monetization model

I don't want their platform forced down my throat. On my PC I can download and install software from wherever I see fit. Had I not being a MacBook Pro user for the time being, I would have a chance to upgrade RAM and SSD without paying twice on the damn device.

If anything, I consider Apple being an anti consumer company. What is good for them, is not good for the end user.

That being said, their devices do have some advantages.

gonzon• 3 years ago

the ironic thing is that the way you describe apple is the way 99% of people outside of hackernews would describe the people of hackernews (or tech ppl in general).

jve• 3 years ago

Stealing? I see it as fee for an exchange to access to a huge market of wealthy people (one that can afford an iPhone probably can afford your app). Where entry barrier is extremely low. If you make 100 sales, you don't have to pay much, if you make huge profits off the platform you make huge payments to the platform owner.

hyperhopper3• 3 years ago

They shouldn't have the right to be the gatekeeper in that relationship.

The wealthy people own the hardware, the devs own the app. Why does apple get the legal right to demand money in that transaction when it would be better for everyone if they weren't involved

DeathArrow13• 3 years ago

one that can afford an iPhone probably can afford your app

If I afford something doesn't mean I should buy. I grew up being poor and I earn my living working hard. Throwing money is not a good option for me.

Also, in what world affording a damn phone does make you rich?

ric2b10• 3 years ago

iPhones are not expensive enough to signal you are rich, most people are able to buy one, the question is if it makes financial sense to do so.

Zetobal• 3 years ago

This guy also hates taxes.

atoav2• 3 years ago

So where can I vote out apple if I am unhappy with the 30%?

Not everything you pay money for is comparable to taxes.

sekai• 3 years ago

That 30% doesn't fund the schools or the roads, it's just a fee. Completely different.

DeathArrow13• 3 years ago

They are not your friend, they do not care about you

Of course they care about you. They hope you are healthy and in a good shape so you can work more to earn more money and give them their share.

Halvedat• 3 years ago

It's very likely that people posting on Hacker News may hold equity in a company like Apple, may have their primary form of income derived from that company or may be able to attribute their sizeable wealth to its growth.

It is no surprise that people will come to the defense of this giant when you stop to consider this. Apple doesn't have to care about them, it already has.

I am of the opinion that there should be some sort of disclosure of financial interest.

lotsofpulp4• 3 years ago

Pretty much everyone that invests in the public equity markets holds equity in Apple. In fact, Apple would be most public market investor’s biggest holding (or 2nd biggest due to Microsoft’s recent increases) via index funds.

Even if you are not invested in public equity markets, you can be exposed to them via local and state government’s pension fund investments, because if those do not perform as projected, then your taxes have to make up for it.

fauigerzigerk• 3 years ago

Maybe so, but I never found this line of argument particularly convincing.

The investments people have in Apple are often insignificant compared to the rest of their income or wealth.

Also, buying shares in the public market is like a bet. Instead of changing your opinion to agree with the bet you could simply bet the other way. Or you could bet that your own political activism will fail. Betting on an outcome doesn't mean you prefer that outcome. It can also be hedging.

The people who really do have something riding on Apple's success are employees getting stock options. And yes, I would also like to know whether someone is an Apple employee when they are commenting on these subjects.

Developers are affected by Apple's policies and success in very complex ways and can legitimately take either side on these questions.

Disclosure: I have an app in the App Store that made me ~£100 in the previous fiscal year. I also have £3000 in a NASDAQ 100 ETF. Apple's share of that is ~£270.

carlosjobim2• 3 years ago

Not everybody who has a different opinion than you is a paid corporate shill or spy from Russia or China. If you seriously harbour these thoughts, you should be careful with where they can lead you. Group schizophrenia has become the most common issue among the population in industrialised countries, it seems everybody is suspecting everybody nowadays. And not only suspecting, but outright accusing, just on a hunch and without any evidence.

Please note that I was not paid by Apple to write the comment above.

todd38343• 3 years ago

They probably do care a lot about developers staying on their platform. The 30% is only from companies making more than $1 million. Otherwise you can qualify for 15% small business program.

I don’t need them to be my friend or to care about me but as a share holder I want them to succeed. So far their R&D has proven valuable to me as both a consumer and share holder.

I don’t care if a few people who already have everything get richer. Since I believe the company is doing great things and I think it still has a bright future ahead I get to share in that upside too. And so can you if you want to.

eptcyka2• 3 years ago

Do they care though? As a developer, I either play by the rules and get access to their massive, lucrative market or I just don't. Its not like the investment developers and Dev companies make into their ecosystem can be just moved elsewhere - its all a sunken cost.

puszczyk• 3 years ago

I don’t care about trillion dollar company. I care about my experience. App Store purchases and subscriptions are a good experience for a user. I’ve never had problems canceling subscriptions, or getting refunds.

ric2b10• 3 years ago

Ok, but the argument is that people should have options, not that you should stop using the Apple store.

ribit10• 3 years ago

I have difficulty following this argument, especially the "stealing" part. App Store does not just randomly take money from the devs. App Store also provides a service. They do world-wide payment and VAT processing, refund processing, discovery, distribution, user login management, APIs, distributed cloud storage, etc. It costs money to run these things. As a small-time developer, I think this is a great deal for 15%. At the price levels of most small apps it would cost more to use a payment processor + hiring an accountant, not to mention the extra work involved in setting up and maintaining these things. For behemoth like Epic — sure, the "Apple tax" hurts, they'd rather gouge their customers without Apple's involvement. But frankly, I don't see any reason to punish one multi-billion corporation just so other multi-billion corporation can make more money. I care primarily about the interest of the small-time developers.

And this is the point that should be made more often IMO — App Stores (and Apple bing one of the first ones) have democratized software development by making the barrier of entry extremely low. Anyone with some talent or idea can go and write an app, without any additional financial risk. App Store is based around sharing your success. The relatively few successful devs carry the costs to keep that barrier of entry low to everyone. And I really don't want that to change.

On a serious notes, what are the alternatives? What exactly is your argument? That Apple should be charging nothing? Ok, then they also shouldn't be providing any services. You want to do distribution or payment processing? Take care of it yourself. Epic would love this of course, Joe the indie developer instead is dead in the water. Or are you arguing that Apple is charging too much? Well, there are solutions to that as well. They could charge for services individually for example, but that again hurts the small developer, because trying out things starts costing them money.

Frankly, my idea would be to split the App Store into a separate commercial entity and make it nonprofit. I am sympathetic to the argument that the Store itself is not a product but is used to support and create value for Apple's ecosystem. I do think that the devs should pay for running the store, and I like the current success-based model and it's low barrier of entry for new devs, so basing the fees on actual operating costs seems like a good compromise. Of course, similar considerations should apply to other stores as well.

Aerbil313• 3 years ago

Well written. It can be argued that Apple also develops the OS and UI libraries which the apps run on/with, which is also providing something.

jdkoeck4• 3 years ago

Again, it’s crazy people defend Apple on this. Apple is not just providing a payment platform, it’s forcing you to use it. As a developer, you should be free to use any payment platform you want in your app, like on the web. Let the user decide. End of story.

pcnix• 3 years ago

The problem is that we place a responsibility on competition in the market to favor consumers by reducing prices and preventing companies from having excessive margins. Allowing a single marketplace means there's no competition, and we're not sure if 15% is a fair rate at all.

I could make the assertion that I'd be able to provide everything that Apple does, but with a much lower cut, but this can't be put to the test because there's no way for me to start another app store that iPhone users can access. I suspect a lot of the arguments for the 15% cut will change once we have alternate app stores offering the same things Apple does, but with a much lower cut. You'll then see app developers with skin in the game, and we'll know if everyone actually really thinks Apple does this better or if they'd rather have the extra money from other app stores.

commandersaki• 3 years ago

The alternative is Apple allows side loading so that you can buy software independently of the App Store , and sellers can distribute independently of the App Store.

CogitoCogito3• 3 years ago

On a serious notes, what are the alternatives? What exactly is your argument? That Apple should be charging nothing?

The alternative is “competition”.

In any case, I don’t see how any of this affects you since you’re happy paying Apple the fees. You can keep doing so as others pursue other options once they’re available.

dns_snek11• 3 years ago

You want to do distribution or payment processing? Take care of it yourself.

Yes! That's exactly what everyone wants.

Joe the indie developer instead is dead in the water.

No, Joe the indie developer will happily use one of the most popular alternative app stores that fits their needs and doesn't rip them off with fees.

wouldbecouldbe4• 3 years ago

It's actually annoying that the refunds and VAT are handled.

For small international developers, under 500K per year spread out over several states & countries, often they don't have to pay VAT in most international places, so they lose an extra 20-22%. For instance most US states won't require you to pay VAT under 100K revenue if you are from another country.

Same for refunds & subscription management, often clients will ask you, but you have zero control with Apple. Let alone 60 days before being paid, where stripe does it in a few days.

lijok2• 3 years ago

You need to learn the difference between defending an entity and defending an argument.

The line of thinking you're expressing here is what leads to questioning free speech and privacy absolutism.

lynx233• 3 years ago

"They are not your friend, they do not care about you"

I beg to differ. As a blind user relying on accessibility, Apple was actually the first company that decided that accessibility should be an inherent part of the OS, not just an expensive add-on. Since the iPhone, blind users can just buy the product and turn speech output on, without having to install expensive extra software as was the case with Windows, for instance.

So keep your generic accusations for yourself, they are far from correct.

cryptonym5• 3 years ago

This is a great result. That being said, I wouldn't bet they did that just because they cared about you in a friendly way.

dingaling• 3 years ago

"...in 1988, the company added the first accessibility support program for Windows by incorporating work developed at the TRACE Center, a research and development center on accessible technology at the University of Wisconsin.

Known then as Access Utility for Windows 2.0, the program improved the accessibility of Windows for people who are deaf, hard of hearing, or who have limited dexterity"

https://www.afb.org/aw/1/4/16165

highwaylights• 3 years ago

Keeping the tax at more or less the same rate on outbound links is incredibly brazen, even by Apple standards.

If the EU DMA does eventually force them to open the platform to competing stores it’s going to be very hard to defend the different policies in different markets, especially as I assume Epic will push aggressively to have Fortnite and the Epic Games store on iOS in those markets as early as possible to force the conversation.

kriops• 3 years ago

That’s a strawman if I ever saw one. Apple is morally entitled to licence their products however they’d like, because property rights. If you don’t like it, then nobody is forcing you to give them your business.

dragonelite• 3 years ago

The lords and churches of the past wouldn't even dare to ask as much as 30% of revenues in our feudal past.

riscy18• 3 years ago

It’s 15% for the commoners (<$1M) and I’d believe that in feudal times.

qwytw2• 3 years ago

IIRC the standard for serfs was 2-3 days of labor per week (in some cases during harvest even up to 5), for a 6 day workweek. Add various random fees and rents and that's way more than 50-60%.

Of course everything improved massively after the plague. So it depends on which part of the middle ages we're talking about.

zer0zzz• 3 years ago

I can understand some perspectives of the Apple-defending crowd. Apple being the popular yet closed-end-to-end platform experience does kind of provide a level of balance in the industry that wouldn’t exist otherwise. I personally think it’s silly to look at Amazon or Google as an example of openness.

I think it’s also kinda weird to label Apple as a monopoly unless you mean a monopoly on revenues. They seem to actively swerve away from getting over 50% share of anything.

toyg11• 3 years ago

They realized that getting over 50% marketshare paints a target on their back, whereas what you want is 50% of profitable money in the market.

If BMW sell 10 cars with $1 margin, Jaguar sell 5 cars with $2 margin, and Ferrari sell 2 cars with $40 margin, the latter took home 80% of profits with 11% marketshare. Then Ferrari just work their hardest to make sure that their customers cannot change car without a lot of effort, effectively coopting (or rather enslaving) them forever.

That keeps antitrust law at bay in practice, while egregiously breaking it in spirit.

maccard7• 3 years ago

It's incredible that there are actually people in this thread arguing in favor of Apple

It's incredible to me that people arguing against apple here don't realise that they're arguing to allow another billion dollar company to do what they want, and that their own opinion is the only one that could possibly be valid

If you want an open ecosystem with alternative app stores, head on over to Android. The value of iOS to me is the app store and related ecosystem.

mihaaly• 3 years ago

Regardless, it is a phenomenon here that negative words on Apple - justified or not alike - attract numerious downvotes without comments, just for the sake of it.

nprateem2• 3 years ago

head on over to Android

I'll just tell all my potential customers to buy a new phone before buying my app. That'll work.

ben_w10• 3 years ago

You don't need to defend the trillion dollar company. They are not your friend, they do not care about you, your work or your life.

True.

All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer.

I'm old enough to have developed software before the App Store existed, and remember that everyone was very excited both buy it finally being introduced to iOS, and by the relatively low fees of only 30%.

You're free to argue that 30% is too high, or even that the 15% for small developers is too high, that this is rent-seeking by Apple and only made sense when they were also a small company… but I think this is also true for the businesses trying to convince everyone that it matters, and I think they would like to charge the same sticker price while collecting the difference for themselves.

sofixa• 3 years ago

and by the relatively low fees of only 30%.

30% is low compared to what? Mafia extortion rates?

pjc50• 3 years ago

It's a small amount compared to retail; it's a large amount compared to a download; and it's infinitely larger than the 0% platform royalty required by IBM-compatible PCs.

nolok2• 3 years ago

The problem is not that 30% is too high or too low, the problem is that it shouldn't be a % but a flat fee structure, like every other services ever.

If you have an app tomorrow that sells for $10 to 10k people you owe Apple $30k, now you manage to up your price to $30, same work same size same everything, but suddenly you now owe Apple $90k ? That's called a tax, not a fee.

Doing so wouldn't stop apple from having a separate, "pay 30% all inclusive" fee, and it wouldn't stop them from "if your app is free you have no fee" (beside the xcode sub fee).

xanderlewis• 3 years ago

I haven't done any defending, but I reject the idea that it's a ridiculous idea to do so. I choose (almost always) to defend people on the basis of whether they are right or wrong (by some measure), emphatically not due to some expectation of return on investment because they 'care about me'. Also, no one is defending Apple because they think 'the trillion dollar company needs defending' -- they're doing it, presumably, because they just so happen to have an opinion on the matter that aligns with Apple's.

the_other• 3 years ago

I often defend Apple. I don't want to defend Apple on this current topic: I think taking a cut of out-of-app physical purchases/subscriptions is ridiculous and should be legally challenged.

However...

All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer.

If you're gonna argue that, you have to inspect the edges of this position. Are you willing to let go of your own shares? Or the interest on your pension (or equivalent), which comes via the roughly the same route you're arguing against. If you own your own company, do you share most/all profits with your staff (rather than pay a wage), or your shareholders? This is all wrapped up together.

IMO, To make such a claim, you need really to argue against the system these "rich people" operate in as much, if not more than, the individual cases.

quonn• 3 years ago

If you own your own company, do you share most/all profits with your staff

This is not the same, there a degrees of unethical behavior. We should collectively try to give more meaning to these degrees instead of jumping to first principles.

Taking your example, there is a difference between taking a cut or underpaying your staff or severely underpaying them or perhaps not paying them at all or perhaps forced labor or perhaps outright slavery.

yard2010• 3 years ago

Ikr. That's a big incentive to be evil! Special snowflakes will vouch for you no matter what

norman784• 3 years ago

As a user I don't care for the 30% cut, what I care is to have a centralised payment method and subscription system, I don't have energy/time to keep with different subscriptions in each service/app and knowing that there are bad actors, they will do whatever possible to make hard to unsubscribe (like a few years ago the NYT, where you could only unsubscribe by phone and was very hard even so). But if even when using third party payment systems they need to integrate with Apple subscription API and you can cancel/track in one place then I'm fine with that.

cryptonym5• 3 years ago

That's a fair statement, you may like Apple payment even if it adds 30% to whatever you are buying. What is not fair is forcing everyone into this.

If I'm selling content, why couldn't I give customer the choice between:

- Paying the 30% Apple cut and benefiting from everything you like about this

- Buying directly, cheaper, without Apple cut (or maybe with a tiny cut if that make any sense, removing only 3pt is a joke)

rezonant• 3 years ago

The inability to unsubscribe should be fixed in the law, not by granting a payments monopoly for all users of a specific operating system or phone model.

klabb34• 3 years ago

Nobody is complaining about that. Apple can freely put whatever price they want for their payment/subscription services. It’s a good product even, albeit with an outrageous price.

People are upset that developers are forced to use that product, and now with this news: pay an extortion fee on a 3p transaction that doesn’t concern Apple.

cptskippy• 3 years ago

I'm not advocating for PayPal, but PayPal does all the stuff that Apple does and they don't charge a 30% cut. I've been contributing to a freeDNS Service managed by PayPal for the last 10-15 years. I noticed the annual renewal was coming up and thought it was time I bump up my contribution, so I went into PayPal and did it.

poszlem• 3 years ago

What a wild take. Epic doesn't care about me either. What difference does it make? Are we supposed to judge if something's right or wrong based on who's doing it, rather than what they're actually doing?

remon4• 3 years ago

This is exactly the wrong argument to make and a perfect example of why internet discussion is becoming harder.

None of what you said matters. It does not matter how much money a company makes or if you personally think they're charging too much for a service. They're allowed to. The open question is if they're in a position where there's no reasonable alternative for developers and/or consumers which you can make a strong case for. That line of argument would not be affected at all by how much money Apple makes, their cut or if they're spending their money in a socially productive way.

The fact that this is the second highest upvoted comment is a rather sad datapoint on issues related to internet based conversation where opinions consistently trump fact or reason.

toyg11• 3 years ago

It does not matter how much money a company makes or if you personally think they're charging too much for a service. They're allowed to.

Ah yes, loan sharks are perfectly legitimate businessmen too, then.

The fact that this is the second highest upvoted comment is a rather sad datapoint

I personally find sadder that there are people who just rationalize away the utter lack of morality in modern capitalism. "Why screw others? Because we can! Woot!" is even worse than "greed is good".

criley23• 3 years ago

All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer

Apple stock is the most widely held stock by American 401k's and forms the basis of retirement investments for middle class Americans more than any other stock

hortense• 3 years ago

Wouldn't that be Microsoft? It's worth 2.9T, vs Apple's 2.84T.

ants_everywhere• 3 years ago

Apple is a lifestyle brand and some people act pretty threatened when that brand is criticized.

namdnay• 3 years ago

make a few people who already have everything even richer.

"a few people" being everyone with a retirement plan, 401k or any equivalent around the world, i.e. the vast majority of people in developed countries

if anything, taking from smaller companies to give to megacorps is a net benefit for "the common man", since the former will generally belong to founders/VCs/private equity in which they have no stake, and the latter are owned by everyone with exposure to the MSCI World :)

hospitalJail• 3 years ago

Its completely obvious Apple has some sort of mind control going on. Its insane to see society is okay with this.

Darthy• 3 years ago

Apple Vision Pro is coming out soon, with the same terrible rules for app developers.

We should put out an open letter to Apple that we will collectively ignore that product until it contains more favourable terms.

spdif899• 3 years ago

Great idea, I was totally planning to spend $3500 on a first gen gadget but now you've convinced me not to

thinkerswell• 3 years ago

It's amazing to me that people in this thread still don't understand free markets. You are free to use Android, or Amazon phone. Or Graphene. Or one of the many others.

webstrand2• 3 years ago

Apple preventing 3rd party software not paying the apple tax from running on their phones is not "free market". The only reason they can get away with this is because of laws that protect their market from 3rd parties.

kasajian• 3 years ago

I'm going to use this post as a reference for what I believe to be one of the least logical arguments I've ever seen on a technical forum. Congratulations.

concordDance• 3 years ago

People can defend Apple purely for "Someone is wrong on the Internet!" reasons. We're mostly not Homo Economicus Machiavelli who only do things for considered reasons.

(I agree that the 30% is probably bad for society though)

kspacewalk25• 3 years ago

What's incredible is the idea that an argument or a point of view is somehow invalidated purely because it happens to side with the trillion dollar company. This is in the same vein as "this cause is supported by teh evil Amerika, hence it must be evil" line of thinking, typically espoused by self-declared anti-imperialists (who are often mere anti-US-imperialists).

make a few people who already have everything even richer.

I do wonder what percentage of Apple stock is owned by pension funds and the like, i.e. The Regular Person, once you unwind the levels of indirection (mutual funds, index funds, ETFs, etc). It is surely a double digit percentage, but high, low? No idea.

timtom39• 3 years ago

I do wonder what percentage of Apple stock is owned by pension funds and the like, i.e. The Regular Person, once you unwind the levels of indirection (mutual funds, etc). It is surely a double digit percentage, but high, low? No idea.

Pretty high. The S&P 500 has ~7% apple stock which means many peoples retirement accounts have several percentage points of apple stock.

Me1000• 3 years ago

Who said "purely"? The arguments in favor of Apple here are invalid for a number of reasons. OP is just saying you don't need to bend over backwards to defend them, they're not an underdog anymore and haven't been for over a decade.

amplex1337• 3 years ago

Does this make them a better company? You are allowed to not like the way a company does business but still own an ETF that profits from their success. I still would never own an Apple item out of principal. Their marketing, hype and fanboyism are their prime success factors it feels like.

It's funny but since the rise of the iPhone I feel like society has gone straight downhill, not that they have been the only player in the smartphone game, but they sure have profited well, are the biggest drain in the industry to the home developers that contribute to their ecosystem. They pay 0 tax and aren't contributing to the better of society through computing while convincing half the population they are protecting them, etc. It's a scam.

Like many large corporations, they aren't ANY better and will plead that it is due to 'competition' while being ahead of the food chain and able to lead in any way they choose.

rchaud2• 3 years ago

It's invalidated because a real-world alternative already exists (Android sideloading) and hasn't required Google to hold everyone's hand or to use their toll roads to distribute the product.

tivert• 3 years ago

What's incredible is the idea that an argument or a point of view is somehow invalidated purely because it happens to side with the trillion dollar company.

What's incredible is how people waste their tiny amount of personal energy defending their exploitation by a corporation that has vastly more resources than them and objectively does not need their help.

Apple is probably the poster child for effectively using marketing to brainwash their customers into identifying with them in a cult-like manner. That cult was close to the only thing sustaining them through the 90s.

rurp• 3 years ago

93% of stock wealth is held by 10% of Americans; the amount of Apple held by The Regular Person is relatively miniscule.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38958534

eaglelamp2• 3 years ago

It's not incredible it is just a different view point. In your second paragraph you take a utilitarian point of view in which case the size of an organization is irrelevant so long as it produces a net gain for society.

An alternative view values human freedom and autonomy. From this perspective the size of an organization is relevant - a large enough organization can impose its will on individuals who don't wish to associate with it.

Neither viewpoint is wrong, but acting as if the one you prefer is somehow more correct or objective is.

mattmaroon• 3 years ago

Big minds think about systems. Small minds think about individuals within the system, like corporations or people, because they can't comprehend the bigger picture or even that one exists.

The people who think Apple is evil because of their size are simply not systems thinkers. They have an illogical view of the world in which the little guy is always right simply because they are the little guy, and thus the big guy must be wrong. It's very similar to the Amerika thing you said. If you don't think about the system Apple or America operates in, it's really easy to hate them.

Which is not to say one can't be a systems thinker and still think this was a bad decision or that Apple is given too much power or does things that are unethical or bad for consumers or whatever else. I totally concur that the government should require Apple and Google to allow sideloading, payments they're not involved in, etc BECAUSE I am thinking about the system and how having two corporations own the device our world runs on is a bad one. And how there's essentially no way for governments to mandate a third viable mobile OS into existence.

But the people who say "I can't believe you'd side with Apple" phrase it that way because they are not thinking of the system. They're thinking small. They think making ad-hoc decisions about individuals within the system is appropriate because they can't think any bigger. If they could, they'd lay out the argument as I just did (and, as many, many people in here did too) or something that was less about the individual.

There's been a lot of this on display (not so much here) in what people say about the whole Israel/Hamas situation too. It's not so much what they say (systems thinkers don't agree anymore than anyone else) but how they say it that tips it off.

throw__away7391• 3 years ago

Who is definitely not my friend is third party app developers who want to side load their trash spamware on to my phone.

Every single platform out there is a dumpster fire of fraudulent and abusive software and products aggressively pushed by deception with every trick or vulnerability they can find exploited.

The App Store works just fine for me as a user as is. I don’t care at all what software you want to install on my phone or what access you feel entitled to.

Someone• 3 years ago

I think you can be unhappy with the 15/30% price cut, yet objectively see little wrong with it, given current capitalistic economies and legislation. There are many other large companies with huge margins that, in your words “steal from society”. Alphabet’s is over 20%, for example, and it’s very hard to avoid them when advertising online. Microsoft likely makes money on Xbox game sales, too.

In capitalism 101, Apple created a market and a shop, so they can set the rules. If they demanded too much, developers would move away, their venture would collapse, iPhones would become less popular, etc.

I think you’ll find that selling ice cream at Disney theme parks similarly is expensive for ice cream vendors. They’ll either demand a cut on revenues or charge a lot for the right to sell stuff, and be picky about who can sell what at their venues.

Large retail companies such as Walmart won’t technically take a cut if you want them to sell your product, but they’ll negotiate lower prices from you, require you to take back any unsold inventory, etc.

In summary: ‘we’ currently allow all kinds of huge companies to play by different rules than small companies and individuals.

For me, the main issue is whether iOS needs special handling because of its success, and if so, what special handling.

The first, for me, is “yes”; smartphones are different enough from theme parks, Xbox and Walmart to handle them differently. The second I’m less sure about.

For example, yes, I’d like to have the option to side-load stuff, but also think Apple should have control over what their iPhone product stands for.

They currently ban apps selling drugs, for example. Requiring them to support third party stores that may have such apps might harm the image of their iPhone product. Because of that, I think we should allow them (but not necessarily be happy with) to put up a firm warning whenever you try to install a third party app store, even though that would put them on unequal footing with Apple’s store.

Maybe, the best solution would be to make Apple’s App Store a non-profit with a monopoly on selling iOS apps, with Apple keeping the right to specify what can and cannot be sold there (keeping that a true non-profit would be hard, though. Some non-profits manage to hoard lots of money over time, their CEO’s ‘deserve’ large salaries, etc)

Friedduck• 3 years ago

Oh grow up. It’s so naive to think there’s no time, effort or money in building what they have. That there’s no ongoing costs. That it doesn’t take thought.

They should build it and you should just get it for free.

Is 30% reasonable? Should there be some taper once your app is in maintenance mode? No, and yes.

I don’t see any reason from either side of this argument frankly. They’ve built a wonderful think that provides immense value, and we all benefit.

They should be more flexible in their pricing model, and you should understand that actual people spent hundreds of thousands of hours of their lives to deliver it to you, and charging for that isn’t stealing.

savanaly• 3 years ago

What about their customers? Am I allowed to speak up for their freedom to engage in consensual commerce? Or is that craven of me as well?

fennecfoxy7• 3 years ago

"B-b-but Google and others do it, too!"

I'd like to quote a passage from Reamde by Neal Stephenson: "So what are you going to do?" Yuxia asked. "Maybe tag along. Like escorting a drunk president home after a long night in the bar." "Didn't you say you had to make a phone call?" "I have been trained by the United States government," Seamus said, "to do more than one thing at a time."

AlwaysRock6• 3 years ago

I wouldnt defend 30% specifically but surely they should get some cut or share. What is the right number? 1%? 50%? I don't know.

All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer.

Kind of an odd take. They take a cut because they provide a service. They are not stealing. I guess lump me in with the defending apple crowd if you want to but to think they would or should charge nothing for their service feels... silly.

PH95VuimJjqBqy4• 3 years ago

only in tech...

can you imagine if selling a replacement bulb for a ford headlight required you to pay 30% to ford.

only in tech can this be considered fair.

barbariangrunge• 3 years ago

Does windows deserve 30%? what about your isp? Or your motherboard manufacturer? What about nvidia? Should every single company providing you software or hardware take a cut, or only apple?

We should own our own computers

linuxhansl• 3 years ago

Seems to me the range of what a credit card charges would seem sensible. I.e. 3-7%.

Alternatively charge 30% but be forced to allow side-installing Apps. That way developers can decide if they want the convenience and reach of the AppStore or not.

thefounder• 3 years ago

They should as much as Mozilla gets for the online transactions carried out on its browser.

m_0x• 3 years ago

All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer.

Steal? What you want the App store to be free and become the Android Play Store which is utter garbage and hostile against small and mid developers?

gustavus• 3 years ago

You know I hear this argument a lot, but had a revelation recently. Everything people are saying about apps and the app store could apply equally well to web browsers and webpages. After all there are plenty of malicious webpages out there that can do bad things, but we decided that it is fine, that's a risk we as society are willing to take. The alternative is to allow large organizations like the state and corporations to tell us what we can and can't do with devices we own and what we can or can't look at.

In conclusion "Information wants to be free."

xigoi4• 3 years ago

I prefer F-Droid. It would be nice if iOS could have something like that too.

drdeca• 3 years ago

You don't need to defend the trillion dollar company. They are not your friend, they do not care about you, your work or your life.

I don’t like what apple is doing here, and am not inclined to defend it.

However, I am inclined to complain about this type of rhetoric. If invalid criticism are being made, it is appropriate to correct those criticisms, even if the criticisms being made are criticisms of some vile person or organization.

dnissley2• 3 years ago

It's super easy to avoid all of this drama: Do not buy an iPhone. Almost any other phone will allow you to download and install arbitrary programs from any source that offers them. It's quite wonderful.

It amazes me that people would rather force apple to open up through dubious court cases than simply buy a different device.

rustcleaner8• 3 years ago

Nothing in current smartphone-land beats a Google Pixel running GrapheneOS.

Put GrapheneOS on your phone(s) and Qubes OS on PC(s), and you have the world's two most secure and owner-respecting operating systems in existence today!!!! :^)

thegrimmest• 3 years ago

I support Apple not because they need my support, but because the supporting argument aligns with my principles. I believe that the entire App Store ecosystem belongs to Apple, and that none of us have any right to dictate what Apple does with it. It's theirs in the same way my organs are mine. Just because it happens to be massively successful doesn't change this. I'm not a negative utilitarian.

squigglydonut13• 3 years ago

I'm an app designer and was able to get my PWA to look very native. This is my way to avoid the app store fees which are absolutely ridiculous. Apps take up too much storage space anyways.

kridsdale1• 3 years ago

I’m extremely familiar with the iOS native components (I even made some of them originally). I’d like to see your PWA to see if your claim is true.

squigglydonut13• 3 years ago

Sure thing but you have to buy my product first! My approach was blending iOS and Android. For example I like the hamburger menu for user adoption (very Android) but I like SF symbols light forms and weight. So there is a blending of forms. Modals and context menus behave as you would expect. I didn't do any blurred backdrops. Lastly, a pwa in fullscreen mode removes the URL bar even through it runs with chrome!

eviks2• 3 years ago

What did you miss in functionality vs a native app?

squigglydonut13• 3 years ago

Definitely. No haptics sadly. I didn't do any blurred backdrops or glassmorphic surfaces. I didn't implement material ripple effects. I increases tap targets beyond native iOS and Android specs.

ativzzz2• 3 years ago

Do you do IAP? Stripe or paypal is just slightly more inconvenient than Apple pay. Does not being in an app store hurt your marketability at all?

squigglydonut13• 3 years ago

What is IAP? Stripe was very easy. It does hurt my marketability you are correct.

squigglydonut13• 3 years ago

Oh in app purchasing. No my product is entirely dependent on the user purchasing a physical product. There's no IAP. Possibly in the future if users want something that is an upsell then I could see that happening. But I would have to hear it from users and by that point they would already be in my app-store-less ecosystem

TheCapeGreek• 3 years ago

Caveat: I am not a mobile dev, I don't really have skin in the game here. I stay away because App & Play store sound like nightmare environments to do business with faceless entities and automated bans without appeal.

It really seems to me the best way around this is:

- Don't sell on the Apple store at all with no alternative (likely same for Google if your particular gripe is the 30%). Stick with web.

- Push more PWAs to your customers. Sounds like Apple is finally opening up a bit on that front? Maybe the EU antitrust will open the doors wider.

- Sell ONLY on Apple (and again Google), then 15-30% is your norm, and you won't feel the "loss" of not having a middleman.

The argument about 30% being standard and OK to me only makes sense without the $99/yr license in place, and if only comparing to other locked down platforms. E.g. with Steam, there's plenty of ways to distribute via Steam and still have them take a lower cut, or you have other stores you can sell on. It's only the consoles that have the same kind of locked-down environment, but even then those are explicitly niche devices whereas phones are general-purpose.

eviks2• 3 years ago

You have skin in the game as a consumer

deadbabe• 3 years ago

Why not merely raise prices if the cut Apple takes bothers you so much?

55555• 3 years ago

Google should update the Chrome TOS so that they get 30% of all sales placed through Chrome, regardless of payment processor used. They're missing out on trillions of dollars and all they have to do is update their TOS!

Hamuko2• 3 years ago

Apple has thankfully figured out that there's good money in online sales so they'll in fact get a cut if you buy stuff on Safari, although only if you use Apple Pay and even then they only get a miniscule 0.15% (or less) cut. I imagine this is because they don't have the technology to skim off all transactions yet and laws prohibiting excessive processing fees.

riscy18• 3 years ago

Does there exist a payment processor that takes zero cut?

Cu3PO42• 3 years ago

I'd argue 0.15% is a huge cut for the service they're offering. With Apple Pay the payment is still being processed by the card scheme, the merchant's acquirer, their bank and the user's bank. Each of these charge fees and Apple's cut likely comes out of the user's bank's cut, since they are the ones co-operating with Apple to get their cards onto Apple Pay. In the EU, this fee called interchange fee is limited to 0.2% for debit cards and 0.3% for credit cards. Imagine if Apple managed to negotiate for 50-75% of that. That would be ludicrous in my eyes.

4pkjai• 3 years ago

A lot of businesses spend more than 30% of their products cost on Google Ads.

I know plenty of people who sell something for $20, and spend $30 on Google Ads to get that user to their site.

AaronFriel• 3 years ago

Those businesses operating at a loss are a tiny fraction of the "real economy", even though they may be giants in the future.

vasco• 3 years ago

Pretty much every VC backed startup for the past 15 years uses that model. Startup success is in a large amount "who can use internet ads the best".

ric2b10• 3 years ago

But at least there are alternatives, even if Google is dominant in the space.

burnerburnson• 3 years ago

What does that have to do with anything? Using Google Ads is not a requirement of having your website be accessible through Google Chrome. It's not analogous to this situation at all.

xnx• 3 years ago

Competitors set those prices, not Google.

lemax• 3 years ago

All this to allow you to process the payment yourself. This is just the industry standard 3% payment processing fee.

IceHegel• 3 years ago

Yes, there's a very real sense in which the world is better for having had Apple than not. They have made technological life more beautiful.

For that reason, people seem strangely committed to defending them through their rent-seeking period.

Apple cannot be both a good company and a monopoly.

As their users, we should not accept the false framing and false choice their management presents of either monopolistic control of the mobile ecosystem or endless spam and a Wild West free-for-all.

I do not understand why people's hearts are still drawn to Apple as the company of Steve Jobs, when it is clearly something very, very different today.

wvenable• 3 years ago

Apple as the company of Steve Jobs, when it is clearly something very, very different today.

What? Tim Cook has done a great job of keeping up the Apple philosophy. What significantly has changed?

DeathArrow13• 3 years ago

So as a customer, if you give Apple lots of money for a phone, you also give them the right to milk you more through app store and commissions. Developers aren't bringing money from home to pay Apple, they are paying Apple from what end users pay.

I hope Apple will be forced to allow third party app stores and sideloading apps.

todd38343• 3 years ago

It’s very interesting to read through the threads. I’m seeing two sides of the argument but clearly the majority here are not happy about what Apple is doing or anyone who tries to stick up for it. I hope people continue to share their perspective. Even if it is not popular to the HN crowd because I appreciate a balanced discussion.

laktak• 3 years ago

If Apple collects a commission here, then why doesn't it collect one on advertising in the app?

blackqueeriroh• 3 years ago

For everyone who thinks Google is some paragon of cooperation and openness as compared to Apple, they just got slammed in court effectively attempting to call their platform open while paying off companies to stay in the Play Store in a very similar case to Epic v. Apple. In fact, this was Epic v. Google. Why did Google lose and Apple largely win?

Because Apple had always said their platform was closed and were up front about it.

Google, on the other hand, called their platform open and then engaged in anti-competitive behavior to get the benefits of a closed ecosystem.

You might not like Apple’s approach, but at least they’re up front and honest about it.

https://news.bloomberglaw.com/antitrust/alphabet-loses-googl...

kelnos13• 3 years ago

I don't judge people's policies and actions based on what they say about them. I judge based on the policies and actions themselves.

Apple is demonstrably more closed (which IMO makes them worse) than Google on this axis. What they've both said about their platforms is irrelevant to me.

dns_snek11• 3 years ago

This is pointless whataboutism, they're both bad. Google is more open as a platform, but sucks in many other ways and Apple doesn't get points for being anti-competitive to begin with.

There's nothing "honest" about deceiving your customers and hiding a 30% fee with NDAs.

SLJ73• 3 years ago

Apple specifically forbids developers from mentioning the 30% cut in their apps. That means either the users pay more, the developers lose money, or they do what Netflix did and just force the user to figure out how to sign up (because you can't direct people to the site either). Apple has completely draconian rules that very specifically leave users in the dark about how app store revenue works. They are in no way transparent with 99% of their customers.

rustcleaner8• 3 years ago

What would happen if a few big boys like Netflix pulled their apps from Apple in protest? Like using Apple's policies to indirectly attack Apple through its users.

lofaszvanitt• 3 years ago

The first thing that should be regulated is the app search functionality. Randomized results for a given query, max. 1 ad supported first entries per page.

pritambarhate• 3 years ago

I think all developers should start charging 30% more (op top of the price for which it sells on website.) if user is purchasing via In App Purchases. Slowly all users will come to know that if you buy on web generally it's cheaper and they will change their behaviour and IAP sells will drop significantly.

tommica• 3 years ago

And I'd guess Apple would make a clause for that, if they don't have it already to ban that kind of behaviour.

az2264• 3 years ago

but that might not happen because of how onerous the rules are for non-IAP. it's an awful user experience, 1) the link isn't where you normally buy, 2) you are warned about leaving, 3) you get switched to a different app, 4) you then got to log in, 5) you got to find what you wanted to buy because no such information was carried, and 6) you got to fill out your card and billing information. Unless you are buying something very expensive, it simply won't be worth it. Especially for subscriptions.

DeathArrow13• 3 years ago

Unfortunately we only have to pick between iOS and Android devices. Android devices are generally less expensive and maybe you have more freedom in some particular situations. Apple devices have better CPUs.

What I would like to see instead is more competition in the OS market and the hardware to be like PCs: you buy whatever device you like and install whatever software you want from wherever you want.

CatWChainsaw• 3 years ago

Sadly Apple's competition in computer OS is Microsoft, and Microsoft saw everything Apple has been doing and thought it was a great idea...

gigel82• 3 years ago

I used to get all riled up about these assholes but then took a step back, looked at my own usage (which I believe is typical for the majority) and realized I didn't purchase an app (or did an IAP) in over 5 years.

So let them burn through their goodwill and suck the gambling whales dry, why do I need to get my blood pressure up over their greed...

thih9• 3 years ago

This feels absurd to the point of comedy. The only thing missing is a monkey’s paw curling its finger and some ominous voice “Epic, be careful what you wish for”.

Gareth3212• 3 years ago

Links cannot be placed directly on an in-app purchase screen or in the in-app purchase flow.

This and the other rules amount to effective evasion of the ruling. If the link isn’t allowed under almost all circumstances, it’s hard to see how Apple is complying in good faith.

Gareth3212• 3 years ago

It’s clear that countries are going to need to legislate this. Existing anti-trust laws are insufficient.

d3vmax• 3 years ago

This made sense earlier when the app store started, now with abundant bandwidth and reduced cost of hosting, and increase in number of developers/apps and other player/markets, they should reduce it to 5%. It is like how we treasured 5 mb internet on mobile devices, now we use that in a sec.

bob10293• 3 years ago

The solution is very simple for me. Stop participating in the native app ecosystems.

The way I see it, you get 2 major pieces of value out of these. First, they serve as a B2C marketing channel. Second, they provide access to certain native hardware features & OS integration.

The first point is difficult to contend with, but HN and Twitter seem to serve as a fine counterpoint.

For native hardware access, I'd recommend just trying it in your browser right now. You'd likely be surprised what works in 2024 on iOS/Safari clients. We've been shipping just a webapp to our customers for the last 3-4 years now. We do 2D barcode scanning, signature capture, etc. without any difficulty these days. You DO NOT need a native app to access camera, location, etc. you may find some friction with the web, but you just have to work through it and have patience.

Watching founders obsess over App Store presence and its requisite taxation is a bit of a red flag for me regarding the effectiveness of their business model. The open web exists - why haven't you even tried it yet? Seems to me it's easier to complain about how unfair things are on twitter than it is to iterate into a viable business.

bdcravens• 3 years ago

The question isn't whether founders have tried the open web, but whether they can reach their customers there. Myself, I feel that as a developer and a power user I'm far enough removed from "regular" users that I don't know the answer to the question, I only know it's important to ask it.

gajnadsgjoas2• 3 years ago

I think it's not that easy, Telegram tried very hard but got forced into apple restrictions in web browsers, you can read many complaints about it from the founder

bob10293• 3 years ago

Exactly how was telegram forced? Are they trying to operate in both pools at the same time?

I am under no legal contracts with Apple, aside from any EULAs I may have clicked through for iOS, etc.

ken472• 3 years ago

Imagine a world where laws forced Apple to enable feature an Apple-compatible version of the Play Store alongside the App Store and vice versa. Likewise with Kindle and any other developer that wants to adhere to a legally mandated App Store API.

How would that not be a net positive for the mobile device ecosystem?

gigatexal3• 3 years ago

Apple will continue to collect 12 to 27 percent comissions ... Apple is the best / ultimate troll. Hilarious.

1vuio0pswjnm7• 3 years ago

"Entitlement"

Interesting terminology.

CodinM• 3 years ago

This thread has a lot of weird turns I'd not expect.

"All they do is steal 30% from society" - objectively it's for providing a service, an infrastructure, a very solid user market, a very solid developer experience (you have to build for a limited number of iOS versions, you don't have to test on a gazillion devices with different flavors of Android), a slightly higher income userbase, and a few others.

Seeing the whole thing simply as "theft" boggles my mind, especially coming from people working in or around this industry.

ken472• 3 years ago

I see lots of comments about potential alternatives to 30%. But the only way to really find new optima is to mandate App Store competition. Force Apple and Google to expose the exact API that their app stores are using and allow the laws of economics to determine the outcome. Even under these conditions, only mega corporations and organizations could compete with Google and Apple, so it’s not utopia, but way better than what we’ve got.

sashank_1509• 3 years ago

Yes Apple is obviously engaging in rent seeking behavior to profit off developers. But do they deserve to do so?

First they invented the smart phone and App Store. That gives them a right to rent seeking by most people’s standards for a particular period of time. It’s why we have patents. Perhaps you think 16 years is a long time but then Mickey Mouse’s patent expired recently.

Second they managed to stave off competition and still maintain a large market share. Smartphones had a large number of companies get into this business, including all of big tech at one point (remember fire phone?) and yet Apple has not barely managed to survive, instead it dominated. That has to count for something. The real problem is this society instinctively sides for the little guy and against the big guy. Sometimes that makes sense, but just like you wouldn’t try to change the rules to reduce the amount Roger Federer earns, there’s no sense in trying to hobble a winning dominant company like Apple. Even as a developer (who’s never worked for Apple), I think developers should just deal with it even if it sucks because I prefer a society where winners get to win. If your product is good enough, you can make users work to pay you and still be a market leader (think Netflix or Kindle store, both of which I buy from my browser).

sschueller• 3 years ago

"First they invented the smart phone and App Store"

No they did not. The first iPhone was released on June 2007 and Apple had no intent to give anybody else the ability to develop any app for their phone. In fact Steve Jobs was vehemently against any app store.

Apple only introduced app store on the second year of its first iPhone launch, one day before release of new iPhone 3G.

Other types of smart phones and app stores existed before Apple.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_Communicator

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Mobile_2003

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Marketplace

majani• 3 years ago

For me the issue is that in a perfect scenario, you would be able to adjust your pricing to 30% more and see whether the market could bear it. But Apple ties developers to fixed pricing tiers which doesn't allow this. Maybe the battle should be for removal of these fixed tiers

amelius3• 3 years ago

This only shows that users still don't fully own their phone.

InsomniacL• 3 years ago

"...the StoreKit External Purchase Link Entitlement (US) to include a link to the developer’s website that informs users of other ways to purchase digital goods or services."

https://developer.apple.com/support/storekit-external-entitl...

I'm guessing Apple were required to provide developers with Alternative Payment options and not 'a link to a webpage that informs users'...

mattdesl2• 3 years ago

Can’t a developer just add a message to their website to circumvent this link tax? “Open this again in any regular browser to receive a 27% discount.”

I don’t see anything that prohibits this: https://developer.apple.com/support/storekit-external-entitl...

Apple cannot (or, per antitrust law, should not) tell a developer how to design and sell their merchandise in their web based storefronts.

ing33k2• 3 years ago

Yeah, but will it matter ? It's a mobile native world. That's why distribution matters.

mattdesl2• 3 years ago

If that messaging is allowed, it is a huge change from before, where external links for taking payment was not allowed at all within an app. A lot of users will probably opt for the 27% discount if given the choice.

HDThoreaun2• 3 years ago

I think if what youre selling is just app based content apple could sue and force an audit. Like if the product is just a subscription to the mobile app they could claim that all revenue received from that is subject to the fee. But if youre selling a more general subscription that can be used on different platforms I think this would work.

markonen• 3 years ago

Apple's policies for external purchases are hilarous. The only goal is to be punitive.

For the External Link Account Entitlement that "reader” apps can use to link to purchase flows off-app, Apple forbids offering IAP in the same app. Why? Because they think this will discourage adoption.

For the new StoreKit External Purchase Link Entitlement that other apps can use for the same exact thing, Apple requires an IAP alternative. Why? Because they think this, too, will discourage adoption.

secondcoming• 3 years ago

Apple isn't a company, it's an economy

aleksandrvin• 3 years ago

‪Should Apple let an alternative way to install ios ipados app first, and then mention about devs benefiting from their user base? ‬

Mutjake2• 3 years ago

Probably an unpopular opinion, but as an Apple user it is okay for me to pay 30% extra (which I often do instead of using Android and getting certain apps for free), so I avoid having to sideload Epic/Facebook/whatnot stuff from their own mandatory app store + having the hassle of figuring out if there's a subscription model and how difficult it is to terminate, how to handle refunds, what darkpattern analytics are included in the appstore binary etc. etc.

If you need certain amount of money per user for the product to be profitable, raise the price to account for Apple's cut. But please do not force me to install app stores from companies which have their lifeblood in data brokering my life. At least I have an understanding with Apple that if they go haywire with that stuff (like it was close with the whole CSAM scanning debacle which damaged my trust in Apple and I started considering alternatives) they will lose my hardware purchases as well.

rustcleaner8• 3 years ago

This is such a common talking point, the "hassle of side-loading app stores and the insecurity of trusting them (for permissions enforcement)," that I wonder if some PR firm out there was hired and this talking point is showing up everywhere so people subconsciously think it's consensus and start parroting it themselves (why I'm now seeing it and responding)! The application security model is at the OS level and not the app store level (which is really just a dressed up branded package manager, and has been done forever in GNU-land).

Mikho• 3 years ago

The real problem with the Apple Tax — it ruins value-chain and makes it uneconomical

For every value created a customer receives there is value captured by a company paid by this customer. Let's say a company creates a service valued as 1X by the customer and the customer pays 1X for that. This balance guarantees accessibility and interest among many customers.

Apple tax demands for a customer to pay 1.43X for the same value of 1X (0.43 = 30% of 1.43). It means that the balance is ruined and customers do not get enough value for what they pay. In value, they still get 1X despite paying for 1.43X.

There is a price elasticity curve that measures how many clients a company loses after each step of the price increase. In other words, a company gets significantly fewer customers due to the increased price at the same time, it’s unable to benefit from an additional 0.43X customers paid. A drop in the revenue is significant. At the same time, the company needs to increase its marketing budget effectively decreasing its margin even more. That makes business unsustainable.

Imagine what a decrease in purchases a product gets if its price is increased by 43%. This ruins all economic assumptions of a business.

Not to mention that if it has any network effect, significantly fewer users result in a degraded experience for all users.

I'm considering using PWA for the next mobile app and not investing in native iOS development. Even 50% fewer users due to PWA installation is better than being a lifetime slave to Apple which extorts 43% of what a company gets after Apple TAX from a user.

nojvek2• 3 years ago

Don't forget the $100 tax just to be part of ecosystem. I paid that twice but didn't get the apps approved. Learnt my lesson.

gretch• 3 years ago

I applaud you taking personal action and voting with your wallet / dev cycles.

it ruins value-chain and makes it uneconomical

This is empirically not true. If the value-chain is so 'ruined' and 'uneconomical'. Why are there so many iOS devs? Lots of people are participating in the system and lots of people are getting rich.

Examples of truly uneconomical ecosystems are Windows Phone and Blackberry - which is why all the devs left and those platforms are dead.

evanmoran• 3 years ago

I don't believe you're accurate. All apps that could charge money through Apple payments stopped doing so long ago and now are "free" with an external subscription or ads: Netflix, Amazon Prime, Microsoft Office, Slack, Google Docs/Drive, Dropbox, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Hey Email, etc. Only free-to-play games / gambling / scam apps stayed in the App Store, and the rest are gone.

dns_snek11• 3 years ago

This is empirically not true. If the value-chain is so 'ruined' and 'uneconomical'. Why are there so many iOS devs?

Survivorship bias. You only see businesses that have high enough margins to eat the fees. Whether that's a desirable set of incentives for long-term prosperity of everyone involved is a different question.

Apple could raise their fee to 90% and there would still be plenty of iOS developers using in-app purchases, because selling a few bytes in a database is effectively free. It would all be trash, but they would definitely be there.

mmcnl2• 3 years ago

It depends on what you consider "value". Apple would argue the distribution through the App Store is part of the value chain. I think the real issue here is that Apple demands 30% always. 30% might be the "distribution value" for small indie devs, but it probably decreases once the developer is big enough and their products are well known (Epic/Fortnite, Spotify). Then it becomes just a tax that indeed skews the price-elasticity curve.

dev_tty01• 3 years ago

Most, if not all, small indie devs pay 15%. Everyone pays 15% for subscriptions after the first year.

dlubarov3• 3 years ago

I think it's useful to separate these scenarios -

1. A user knows they want to install a certain app; they do so using the app store since that's the only method Apple allows.

2. A user discovers an app while browsing the App Store, but Apple isn't involved beyond that.

3. A user discovers an app through Apple's marketing, e.g. from WWDC.

With (1), it feels very unfair for Apple to charge 30% just to essentially get out of the way. It's not too far off from Apple threatening to block websites from Safari unless they agree to a ransom payment.

With (2), Apple did refer the customer in some sense, but it still feels unfair in a way since the user was essentially forced to use their App Store for discovery.

With (3), at least Apple is putting in some kind of work (specific to the app) rather than purely rent seeking. Still feels morally questionable since developers have no choice to opt out, though.

realusername• 3 years ago

Imagine what a decrease in purchases a product gets if its price is increased by 43%. This ruins all economic assumptions of a business.

That's exactly why the apps succeeding financially on the play store and app store are casino-like games.

MagicMoonlight• 3 years ago

“Supermarkets ruin the value chain, consumers should pay only the grain price”

SilverBirch2• 3 years ago

To be honest it sounds like you've swallowed an econ 101 textbook along with a few libertarian talking points. I was just waiting for you wheel out Deadweight loss.

The problem with modelling this as a tax is that... it's not a tax in a pure sense. Apple has partly built the product that you're selling. You're building on their hardware with their libraries and their APIs and their servers and their quality control. They want compensation for that.

Now you can argue what level of compensation is fair, and as you point out, its a free market and you even have an option to use a different technology to build you product. The alternative is that Apple doesn't collect this cut of the profits and you have to actually engage in what that means.

Why would they build APIs for you? Why would they distribute your app at all. What happens for example if we pass a law tomorrow saying "Sorry Apple, you can only collect enough for credit card fees".

Well one option is Apple just closes the store, hires a couple hundred high quality developers and builds out their own library of Apps, take 100% of the revenue. No tax in that situation! But I'm not sure it's a better outcome for developers.

msm_• 3 years ago

Well one option is Apple just closes the store, hires a couple hundred high quality developers and builds out their own library of Apps, take 100% of the revenue. No tax in that situation! But I'm not sure it's a better outcome for developers.

It's also not better for Apple, quite obviously, or they'd already do this. People want and expect their favourite apps to work on their phones.

evandale• 3 years ago

Why would they build APIs for you? Why would they distribute your app at all. What happens for example if we pass a law tomorrow saying "Sorry Apple, you can only collect enough for credit card fees".

They would do it because they make massive margins off hardware. Apple can't build good software and third party iOS devs are a major reason why the iPhone is successful.

thewileyone• 3 years ago

But but but I love my walled garden ...

joshspankit• 3 years ago

There’s a lot to talk about but I’m calling this out as trivial, easy, and in bad faith:

No redirecting, intermediate links, or URL tracking parameters are allowed.

It’s 100% clear to me that the link they let you use will be a redirected intermediate link through Apple’s servers, probably with tracking params (and at the very least with OS-level tracking).

ThinkBeat• 3 years ago

I am not that happy with this.

From a legal perspective and the size of Apple I understand why this happened and for the most part I fully agree with the legal arguments.

I went with Android for a well over a decade and it was fun. So many things I could do with it and so many ways to fiddle with it even rooting it. My nerd in me like that.

I had an iPhone for a while and the lack of customizations and fiddling was quite annoying, switched back, then a few years ago I went and got an iPhone for reals (I mean fully knowing what I was giving up).

I was tired of all the Android problems. I didn't enjoy fiddling anymore I had no longer an interest in rooting it. and I was pissed off about 6000 different Android implementations and how older phones lost Android updates quickly leaving plausible security vulnerabilities.

(I suppose Google phones get all the updates for a long time). and usually, one vendor would make their own "enhancements" to the OS anyways.

I became the enemy and embraced the walled garden, the shitty game of move your new app icon around and around to try to fit it where you want it, more expensive hardware/cables etc. In my opinion there is less shit in the app store as well.

As long as the sideloading and whatever else does not impact my phone as long as I dont do it myself I am fine with it. It it leads to more vulnerabilities and other problems for everyone I dont like it.

It is not the 100% great mobile phone. (hello my classic BB), and at times inconvenient but I prefer a nice walled garden and limits on what I can do.

I also prefer all my family and friends to be on the iPhone, if and only if I know I will be providing endless technical support

"uh you need to fix my cellphone!" > ok.,. what phone do you have? Well its a model XXX from YYY company about 4 years old. > Do you know what version of Android its running? ¹ Sure its the VVV version customized for YYY but it has not been updated for over year. > Buy an iPhone.

another day

"uh you need to fix my cellphone!" > ok.,. what phone do you have? " uh it is an iPhone 10" > great. > what is the problem?

¹ In real life there is no way the people I provide with unwilling endless technical support would have even a small inkling of what OS it is running. but it fit the made-up dialog.

mzs• 3 years ago

Apple just admitted that 3% is the reasonable cost for bandwidth and service related to an online storefront and that their margin is huge.

SLJ73• 3 years ago

No, 3% is just Apple accounting for credit card processing fees. It will end up costing developers roughly the same whether they use alternative payment methods or not, which is obviously Apple's plan.

nojvek2• 3 years ago

The browser paradigm may be the most open platform we have. I can go to any website, download whatever I want and not pay tax to some central authority.

I can inspect the dom, scripts run on my device, the network. Set adblockers and script filters.

None of those freedoms are available on smartphone apps. As a dev you pay the trillion dollar mega corps, as a consumer you also pay to them.

The app paradigm could have been as open as the web, but we voted with our dollars for a walled garden with 30% tax.

1letterunixname• 3 years ago

And you wonder about the corrosive influence of billionaires giving lavish vacations to SCOTUS judges and senators who accept gold bars from foreign governments affects legal rulings or legislation presented spoon-fed by lobbyists. Of course the Apple mafia will still get a cut of something they don't deserve because the law and the legislature are on their side.

beretguy3• 3 years ago

People should completely abandon app development and make PWAs instead.

squigglydonut13• 3 years ago

I designed and built my PWA. You just have to define a manifest and set an empty service worker. Boom now your mobile responsive app is a PWA. PWA can look exactly like native app if you are careful with the design. There are navigation patterns that users expect. Make sure to dial in the information hierarchy and design modals correctly. Use familiar iconography and use type that works at small point sizes. This is basic mobile design regardless of platform.

Firefox hooks into the Android type display settings. I would like to see chrome support this. It really adds to the app feel.

When you make a PWA you have to remake native components. Material Design 3 Web Components is not done yet. Apple has nothing for you so just set your border radius to 17px or whatever they use. Backdrop filter blurs.

You don't get the advertising from the app and play store. You don't get discoverability. However, discoverability is a marketing function. If your acquisition costs are under 30% of your product fees then there is no reason why you can't drive users to your mobile optimized website.

mentos• 3 years ago

Curious to know what frameworks you are using?

squigglydonut13• 3 years ago

Nextjs and native browser components that I style in ways that are familiar to mobile app users. So like ,<input> and you use CSS to give it 8px border radius and 48px height. Since I'm going for a material style with an iOS feel I mix the forms. Another example is I use a hamburger menu but I use sf symbols light "icon" as an SVG.

pritambaral• 3 years ago

Is it still true that iOS PWAs cannot be opened with a link (except from a notification pushed to the app).

squigglydonut13• 3 years ago

Interesting. Can you explain more about exactly when that happens? I can test it with mine.

bob10293• 3 years ago

In a B2B setting, this whole class of issues can be resolved with basic endpoint management. For some of our customers, we use InTune to push our PWAs as homescreen icons to enrolled iOS devices. Other customers dont even care about the icon being done automagically. Their users will either open safari directly (gasp) or will setup the icon however they prefer.

sccxy2• 3 years ago

Some recent iOS PWA bugs:

Dark/light mode switching does not work

Wake Lock API does not work

These features work in browser.

squigglydonut13• 3 years ago

No, dark and light mode does work. I haven't used wake lock api so can't check.

politician5• 3 years ago

[3% discount]
Apps that use the StoreKit External Purchase Link must continue to offer in-app purchases as an option.

This is worthless. I cannot believe a court allowed Apple to get away with such a useless remedy.

kesavvaranasi• 3 years ago

I don't understand why Apple is asking for a commission if the developer is implementing their own payment flow. If Apple is still mandating that you offer in-app purchase as an option alongside a custom payment flow, then Apple charging a commission for both options seems excessive.

chucke1992• 3 years ago

I think DOJ lawsuit will be interesting.

CountSessine• 3 years ago

At some point I guess Apple will have to give up the 30% and instead charge more directly for their costs associated with running the App Store, namely hosting costs (probably very small) and the cost of testing and reviews (probably larger). If there are competitive App Store's, that where all of the free software will wind up.

anonymous344• 3 years ago

How is an has been okay all this time for example Trello in the app store? Users subsribe to it's paid-tiers only from their website

insane_dreamer5• 3 years ago

I see the App Store no different than any retailer. If you want to sell your products in WalMart, then you agree to their terms (which happen to be quite onerous), and they set the price that they want. If you don't like it, you don't have to sell your product in Walmart. You can still sell it at Target (if you agree to their terms), etc., or you can try to open your own store and try to reach your target customers directly (and incur the related costs of doing so).

iknowstuff• 3 years ago

Not analogous at all. Amazon is the online equivalent of that.

You the consumer can go to a different store any time on a whim. You can shop anywhere online with a click.

Not the App Store, which controls what and how over half of Americans can access, and the barrier to switching OS-es is fucking huge. How is this remotely the same

015a2• 3 years ago

This is the problem with metaphor; eventually their legs run out.

The more correct metaphor is: Walmart sells you a coloring book. In the back of that coloring book there's a mail-in coupon: send it in, $5 for a second coloring book. Walmart now not only expects to make a cut on that initial coloring book sale; they expect to make a cut on that mail-in sale.

One might say: Wait a second, if I'm going to buy that second coloring book, its probably because the first one was so good. If I'm going to buy a book from Kindle, its probably because that book was surfaced to me in the Kindle app. Walmart and Apple didn't exactly have a large hand in making that second sale happen; my product clearly had a much larger hand in it. Apple would, of course, disagree; because they have a god complex.

insane_dreamer5• 3 years ago

I understand what you're saying but the original metaphor still stands. In-app purchases are like other related products produced by your company, which you are still selling through Walmart -- it's just that you're not using Walmart's payment system for purchases.

vonwoodson• 3 years ago

This discussion always drives my mind back to what it's like to be a "Corporate Citizen" Like, when the free market has completely taken over: What is it actually going to be like. I think Apple is the closest to serving many of the "essential government functions" of my life: Health Records, Credit Card and currency (in Apple Cash), Identification Card/Drivers License... I don't see this trend going away as time moves on, either.

In this light, I see what Apple is doing to Epic as totally legit: It's like any other government taxing a business within it's borders. Apple needs to take a cut to make sure that the infrastructure for all these services it provides to us citizens is funded. I'd be happy with a 95% income tax on The 1%: why wouldn't I be happy with a 20-something% tax on Epic? Epic going to the Supreme Court is similar to them asking to not have to pay taxes in my 'Nation of Apple' and I'm not sure that I want that.

Of course, this is from a certain frame of thought, and may not actually be how I genuinely feel about this. More of a thought experiment.

dpc_01234• 3 years ago

I wish Apple could do 90% cut. Serves their users and developers right.

If you don't think it's worth it, no one is forcing you to use it or developer your software for them. :)

visarga• 3 years ago

101% cut FTW

US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

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